..IE  RELATION  OF  THE  FEDERAL 
GOVERNMENT  TO  EDUCATION 


INSTALLATION'  OF  DAVID  KINLEY 
AS  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


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President  David  Kinley 


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PROCEEDINGS 


OF  A  CONFERENCE  ON 

THE  RELATION  OF  THE  FEDERAL 
GOVERNMENT  TO  EDUCATION 

INSTALLATION  OF  DAVID  KINLEY 

AS  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


DECEMBER    I   AND   2,    1 92 1 


PUBLISHED  BY  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 
URBANA 


3*)Cc3n> 


CONTENTS 


Early  Congressional  Appropriations  for  Education,  by 
Eugene  Davenport    


Recent  Federal  Legislation  for  Education,  by 

Samuel  P.   Capen    20 


The   Installation  of  President  Kinley,  by 

William  L.  Abbott  28 


The  Relation  of  State  and  Nation  in  Educational  Policy, 

by  David   Kinley    31 

Problems  of  Administering  Federal  Appropriations,  by 

E.  W.  Allen    47 

Problems  of  State  Universities  in  Administering  Federal 

Funds,  by  W.  O.  Thompson 59 

Discussion  of  the  Papers 

F.  B.  Mumford   68 

C.  E.  Chadsey 69 

H.   S.  Magill   69 

W.  S.  Sutton   71 

W.  O.  Thompson   73 

G.  H.  Reavis  74 

Eugene  Davenport   74 

J.  H.  MacCracken   75 

Federal  Aid  to  Education,  Its  Justification,  Degree,  and 

Method,  by  Horace  M.  Towner   yy 


499185 


Constitutional    and    Political    Significance    of    Federal 

Legislation  on  Education,  by  Thomas  Sterling...  89 

Discussion  of  the  Papers 

C.  H.  Judd 98 

H.  S.  Magill   100 

W.  S.  Sutton    102 

R.  A.  Pearson    102 

List  of  Delegates  and  Representatives   104 

The  Program  of  Exercises    109 


EARLY  EFFECTS  OF 
CONGRESSIONAL  APPROPRIATIONS  FOR  EDUCATION 

By  Eugene  Davenport,  Dean  of  the  College  of  Agriculture 
and  Vice-President  of  the  University  of  Illinois 

HE  passage  by  Congress  of  the  so-called  Morrill  or 
Land  Grant  Act  in  1862  was  probably  the  most 
significant  single  action  ever  taken  affecting  the 
educational  policy  of  a  people.  It  was  also  the 
most  prolific  in  developing  a  series  of  fundamental 
issues  as  to  the  very  philosophy  of  education. 
Because  we  now  have  in  every  state  of  the  Union  at  least  one 
land  grant  college  or  university;  because  many,  if  not  most,  of 
our  modern  issues  in  education  have  developed  either  directly  or 
indirectly  out  of  this  original  land  grant  legislation;  and  because 
our  problems  are  not  yet  fully  solved,  it  is  well  that  we  meet  in 
conference  from  time  to  time  to  compare  ideas  in  order  always 
that  the  next  step  may  be  intelligently  taken.  It  is  my  purpose 
by  way  of  introduction  to  call  attention  to  some  at  least  of  the 
direct  and  indirect  results  growing  out  of  this  legislation,  the  full 
significance  of  which  can  hardly  be  appreciated  except  by  those 
who  have  been  for  forty  years  or  so  intimately  connected  with 
the  development  of  this  new  form  of  educational  effort. 

Whoever  reads  the  Morrill  Act  at  all  critically  will  be  struck 
by  the  following  facts: 

1.  About  sixty  years  ago  a  new  kind  of  education  was  pro- 
vided to  serve  what  Professor  Turner  called  the  95  percent,  or  the 
industrial  element  of  society,  as  distinct  from  the  five  percent  rep- 
resenting the  so-called  learned  professions. 

2.  This  new  kind  of  education  was  to  be  of  collegiate  grade 
in  sharp  contrast  to  the  old  apprentice  system  or  even  of  what 
later  came  to  be  known  as  the  trade  school. 

3.  There  was  to  be  at  least  one  of  the  new  colleges  in  every 
state  of  the  Union  and  to  that  extent  the  system  was  nationalized 
from  the  beginning. 

4.  For  the  support  of  this  college  Congress  donated  to  each 
state  public  lands  not  equally  but  in  proportion  to  its  population. 

5.  The  college  was  to  be  operated  by  the  state,  which  was 
to  provide,  free  of  expense,  the  necessary  lands  and  buildings.  It 
was  to  this  extent  a  local  enterprise. 

6.  In  case  the  land  grant  should  be  found  insufficient  for 
the  support  of  the  college,  it  was  left  inferentially  to  take  care  of 
itself  as  best  it  could.    To  this  extent  the  individual  college  ac- 


8  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

cepted  the  chances  of  starving  between  two  perfectly  good  sources 
of  support.  It  seemed  to  be  assumed  from  the  first  that  these 
colleges  were  not  to  be  recipients  of  private  gifts,  though  nothing 
in  the  law  forbade  it. 

In  practice,  it  has  been  the  state  that  has  provided  the  bulk 
of  the  means  for  carrying  out  the  original  plan,  and  the  modern 
land  grant  university  is  ninety  percent  or  more  a  state  institution, 
at  least  when  considered  from  the  standpoint  of  support. 

7.  These  new  colleges  were  obliged  to  teach  military  science 
and  tactics,  the  only  provision  added  by  Congress  to  the  original 
plan  as  prepared  by  the  friends  of  the  bill.  To  this  extent  the 
new  system  of  education  was  distinctly  Federal. 

8.  The  course  of  instruction  was  not  prescribed  beyond  the 
single  detail  of  the  military  but  it  was  stipulated  that  emphasis 
should  be  laid  upon  those  subjects  that  bear  directly  upon  agri- 
culture and  the  mechanic  arts,  tho  scientific  and  classical  studies 
were  not  to  be  excluded.  Within  these  bounds  the  institution  was 
autonomous  as  to  its  academic  policies. 

All  these  features  of  the  Morrill  Act  were  substantially  new 
in  the  field  of  education,  most  of  them  entirely  so.  It  is  true  that 
education  of  collegiate  grade  at  public  expense  had  been  provided 
in  some  of  the  newer  states,  notably  Michigan  (1837)  and  Wis- 
consin (1848),  yet  the  latter  institution,  founded  in  the  name  of 
the  state  with  no  endowment  other  than  four  townships  of  public 
land  donated  by  the  government,  received  nothing  from  the  treas- 
ury of  Wisconsin  until  1870,  or  twenty-two  years  after  its  open- 
ing.   No  wonder  it  almost  suspended  during  the  Civil  War. 

The  only  agricultural  college  in  America  at  the  time  of  the 
passage  of  the  Morrill  Act  was  that  of  Michigan,  founded  under 
the  constitution  of  the  state  in  1857,  and  its  first  graduating  class 
had  gone  to  the  war  a  year  before  the  Land  Grant  Act  passed 
Congress. 

The  Sheffield  Scientific  School  of  Applied  Chemistry  was 
opened  in  1847,  but  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson  did  not  begin  his  lec- 
tures in  agricultural  chemistry  until  the  year  in  which  the  Michi- 
gan Agricultural  College  was  opened.  These  two,  one  in  the  West 
and  one  in  the  East,  were  the  only  institutions  of  learning  in 
America  which,  at  that  time,  even  remotely  touched  agriculture. 

The  great  subject  of  mechanic  arts  was  not  represented  in 
the  Michigan  Agricultural  College  or  in  any  other  institution  of 
collegiate  grade,  for  the  Massachusetts  Institute  of  Technology 
was  not  established  until  1865  so  that  the  Morrill  Act  was  the 
first  attempt  to  provide  collegiate  instruction  in  the  field  of  knowl- 
edge which  has  since  developed  into  engineering. 


EARLY  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  9 

Here  then  in  this  Federal  legislation  founding  a  comprehen- 
sive system  of  industrial  education  was  something  essentially  new, 
if  not  indeed  revolutionary.  It  was  new  in  the  materials  of  edu- 
cation, new  in  methods,  new  in  objectives,  new  in  relationships. 
How  new  and  revolutionary  it  really  was  did  not  at  first  become 
evident.  It  appeared  only  as  the  new  plan  proceeded  to  feel  its 
way  along  in  its  development,  for  it  had  few  precedents,  few  dis- 
ciples, and  no  established  criteria. 

But  time  passed.  Failures  and  disappointments  were  over- 
come by  new  devices,  and  by  and  by  there  began  to  appear  the 
effects  of  this  unique  bit  of  legislation,  and  its  influence  began  to 
be  felt  not  only  in  the  material  world  about  us  but  in  every  rela- 
tion of  society,  including  the  very  material,  methods,  and  purposes 
of  education  as  we  are  coming  now  to  understand  the  term. 

It  is  the  present  purpose  to  provide  something  of  a  back- 
ground for  our  discussion  by  retracing  rapidly  some  of  the  direct 
and  indirect  results  of  this  Land  Grant  Act,  as  they  have  influ- 
enced educational  development  and  as  they,  bear  upon  our  pres- 
ent day  problems.  I  shall  do  this  briefly  under  a  few  specific  head- 
ings, which  while  they  do  not  exhaust  the  field  yet  fairly  represent 
the  principal  features. 

First  of  all,  this  new  adventure  in  education  invoked  the 
special  aid  of  science  and  in  that  way  it  became  at  once  the  chief 
patron  and  advocate  of  this  new  field  of  knowledge.  In  this 
connection  it  must  be  remembered  that  at  the  time  of  the  passage 
of  the  Morrill  Act  what  was  then  called  science  had  not  obtained 
a  respectable  foothold  in  the  world  of  education  which  was  brought 
up  and  trained  in  the  atmosphere  of  the  classics. 

And  this  was  not  unnatural,  for  as  yet  even  chemistry,  the 
foremost  of  all  the  sciences  in  its  development,  had  hardly  made 
a  beginning.  A  dozen  years  after  the  signing  of  the  Morrill  Act, 
there  were  yet  six  so-called  incondensible  gases,  and  only  about 
sixty  elements  had  been  discovered. 

Darwin's  "Origin  of  Species"  was  but  just  off  the  press  and 
had  hardly  begun  to  invoke  the  anathemas  of  the  clergy.  Many 
still  believed  in  spontaneous  generation  and  proved  it  to  their 
own  entire  satisfaction. 

Our  own  Doctor  Burrill  of  blessed  memory  told  me  once 
that  when  he  was  a  young  man  studying  botany,  Harvard  was 
the  only  place  in  America  where  the  subject  was  really  taught, 
and  even  there  the  course  was  not  as  good  as  that  now  to  be  found 
in  almost  any  of  our  modern  high  schools. 

Electricity  had  been  harnessed  to  the  telegraph  wire  but  was 
deliberately  adjudged  at  this  time  by  one  of  our  foremost  scient- 
ists as  entirely  useless  for  anything  further  than  telegraphy. 


io  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

The  record  in  the  rocks  had  not  then  become  generally  known, 
and  the  religious  world  was  yet  to  contract  its  congestive  chill  over 
Winchell's  "Pre-Adamites." 

It  was  seven  years  after  the  passage  of  the  Land  Grant  Act 
when  the  educational  world  was  first  shocked  into  a  kind  of  par- 
alysis and  then  aroused  into  almost  a  religious  frenzy  because  a 
professor  of  chemistry  had  been  elected  President  of  Harvard  Uni- 
versity. It  was  then  and  for  years  after  that  the  Michigan  Agri- 
cultural College  operated  next  to  Harvard  the  largest  chemical 
laboratory  and  was  the  foremost  exponent  of  science  in  the  west- 
ern world. 

We  talked  a  great  deal  about  the  new  education  in  those 
early  days,  but  as  late  as  the  seventies  what  we  really  meant  was 
science  rather  than  agriculture. 

The  contest  as  to  whether  agriculture  was  or  was  not  a  sub- 
ject capable  of  affording  the  materials  for  education  came  much 
later.  For  a  generation  the  classics  fought  tooth  and  nail  the  pre- 
tentions of  what  is  now  called  pure  science,  and  a  good  part  of 
the  issues  were  raised  by  the  activities  growing  out  of  the  Land 
Grant  Act,  which  vitalized  science  by  showing  it  at  work  and 
therefore  hastened  the  day  of  reckoning  between  the  new  and  the 
old  in  education. 

One  of  the  first  and  most  bitter  issues  raised  by  the  Land 
Grant  Act  was  the  objective  towards  which  the  new  system  was 
to  be  directed.  Aiming  as  it  did  at  the  benefit  of  the  industrial 
classes,  it  not  only  concerned  the  ninety-five  percent  directly,  but 
it  raised  questions  of  equal  import  to  the  members  of  that  small 
minority  occupying  the  position  known  as  the  learned  professions. 

Ignoring  the  fact  that  nothing  is  more  professional  than  a 
course  in  medicine,  law,  or  even  theology,  for  that  matter,  the 
teachers  of  the  times  immediately  began  to  exalt  culture  as  the 
great  object  in  education.  They  had  been  in  the  habit  of  exhorting 
the  children  in  the  primary  schools  to  get  their  lessons  well  that 
they  might  not  in  later  years  be  obliged  to  work. 

It  is  impossible  in  these  days  to  realize  the  full  extent  of  the 
excitement  aroused  during  the  period  of  this  discussion.  We 
were  about  to  educate  the  laboring  people,  after  which  manifestly 
they  would  no  longer  work.  If  civilization  were  to  stand,  there 
must  be  "hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water."  Unless  the 
masses  should  be  willing  to  labor,  there  could  be  no  leisure  class 
and  therefore  no  culture,  and  it  was  assumed  that  people  would 
not  work  with  the  hands  if  by  any  possibility  labor  could  be 
avoided.  At  the  best,  farmers  and  artisans  might  be  "trained" 
but  they  could  not  be  readily  educated. 


EARL  Y  FEDERAL  LEGISLA  TION  1 1 

The  generation  of  discussion  and  of  experimental  activity, 
whereby  something  besides  culture  became  the  prime  objective 
in  education  is  now  an  interesting  but,  let  the  gods  be  thanked,  a 
closed  chapter  in  our  educational  history.  Even  so,  we  may  as 
well  recognize  the  fact  that  we  owe  to  the  Land  Grant  Act  as  to 
nothing  else  the  impelling  and  the  compelling  influences  that 
broke  down  what  was  virtually  the  beginnings  of  a  caste  system 
in  this  country,  whereby  a  form  of  education,  originated  for  the 
training  of  the  governing  class,  was  rapidly  becoming,  under  the 
head  of  culture,  the  piece  de  resistance  of  a  privileged  class ;  a  class 
constituting  nothing  short  of  an  aristocracy  of  learning — a  kind 
of  close  corporation  for  holding  the  world's  stock  of  knowledge. 

It  was  during  this  long  discussion  that  science  won  its  way 
into  the  college  curriculum  until  it  was  able  to  stand  side  by  side 
with  the  classics,  not  only  in  its  teachableness  but  in  its  value  to 
civilized  society.  During  all  these  days  the  two  first,  and  for 
many  years  the  only,  active  agricultural  colleges,  Michigan  and 
Massachusetts,  were  generally  accredited  with  good  intentions 
but  with  harboring  educational  heresies  of  the  most  dangerous 
character.  And  it  was  they  that  bore  the  brunt  of  the  early  in- 
tense and  sometimes  acrimonious  discussions  wherein  many  a 
scholar  honestly  believed  that  the  good  temple  of  learning  was 
being  undermined  at  its  very  foundation  and  that  its  pillars  were 
already  toppling. 

It  so  happened  that  neither  the  Michigan  nor  the  Massachu- 
setts Agricultural  College  paid  the  slightest  attention  to  mechan- 
ical arts,  so  the  discussion  centered  about  science  and  agriculture. 
After  a  time  under  the  provision  of  the  Morrill  Act  a  considerable 
number  of  agricultural  and  mechanical  colleges  were  established 
in  other  states,  whereupon  engineering  as  we  now  understand  the 
term  began  rapidly  to  develop,  and  it  must  be  confessed  that 
engineering  succeeded  better  than  agriculture  had  done.  Whether 
it  was  from  the  inertia  of  what  had  gone  before  or  whether  from 
the  better  adaptability  of  shop  practice  to  the  forms  of  educa- 
tional procedure,  it  is  difficult  to  determine.  In  any  event,  it  was 
engineering  that  first  achieved  distinctive  success  in  developing 
an  industry  into  a  profession.  It  now  became  clearly  apparent 
that  this  new  education  aimed  at  material  welfare  and  at  the 
development  of  the  activities  of  civilization  as  well  as  the  culture 
of  the  individual  citizen. 

This  was  a  new  idea  in  the  world,  at  least  a  new  ideal  in 
education,  and  it  immediately  brought  the  charge  of  commercial- 
ism and  the  prostitution  of  the  Goddess  of  Education  by  pulling 
her  down  from  her  pedestal  and  setting  her  at  work  to  earn  her 
living.     Here  again  was  one  of  the  most  bitterly  fought  issues 


12  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

arising  out  of  the  new  system  of  education.  It  was  for  a  decade 
the  cause  of  battle  between  the  old  school  and  the  new.  Looking 
back  upon  the  carnage  from  these  later  days  of  comparative  peace 
that  have  happily  followed,  and  thru  the  eyes  of  moderation,  it 
is  perhaps  fair  to  say  that  both  sides  were  at  fault,  each  flying 
to  its  own  extreme.  As  the  men  of  the  classics  decried  commer- 
cialism, utilitarianism,  and  the  prostitution  of  education,  the  men 
of  the  new  school  worshipped  the  practical,  the  things  that  could 
be  made  to  pay  as  measured  by  dollars  and  cents.  Only  slowly  did 
each  begin  to  realize  that  he  possessed  but  a  portion  of  the  vision  of 
what  education  ought  to  do  and  could  do  for  a  civilized  race  and 
that  humanity  needed  them  both. 

This  lesson  was  not  learned  until  institutions  of  university 
rather  than  of  the  college  point  of  view  began  to  function  along 
the  lines  of  the  Morrill  Act.  Then  it  was  that  slowly  but  surely 
the  classicist  began  to  speak  more  respectfully  of  the  development 
of  science,  and  even  of  agriculture  and  of  engineering.  The  agri- 
culturist and  the  mechanic  began  to  see  that  we  must  have  phi- 
losophers as  well  as  high  class  producers,  and  both  began  to 
realize  that  we  are  living  together  in  a  vast  complex;  that  we 
belong  to  one  society  in  which  the  interests  of  the  whole  are  vastly 
superior  to  the  interests  of  any  one  class,  so  that  the  building  up 
of  differences  and  the  emphasizing  of  peculiarities  is  not  only  dan- 
gerous but  profitless. 

In  this  way  it  is  that  in  the  very  locking  of  horns  between 
the  representatives  of  the  five  percent  and  the  champions  of  the 
ninety-five,  we  have  at  last  settled  down  together  with  the  object 
of  solving  the  problems  of  our  individual  and  class  interests  in  the 
light  of  our  mutual  welfare.  All  talk  of  commercializing  education 
has  happily  vanished  and  we  no  longer  observe  the  spectacle 
of  educators  decrying  the  utility  side  of  education  while  they 
themselves  are  earning  their  living  by  means  of  their  learning, 
just  as  farmers  do  by  means  of  their  plows.  With  this  new  un- 
derstanding we  have  largely  lost  the  old  distinctions  between  the 
professional  and  the  non-professional  purposes  in  education,  be- 
tween the  industrial  and  the  cultural, — distinctions  that  we  are 
well  rid  of,  as  they  tend  in  all  of  this  to  obscure  rather  than  to 
elucidate  the  problems  that  lie  before  us. 

One  result  of  these  discussions  and  of  the  clearer  views  that 
developed  out  of  the  relations  between  the  old  education  and  the 
new  was  the  fact  that  education  is  no  longer  to  be  considered 
primarily  as  an  individual  possession.  The  old  time  colleges  had 
been  organized  and  conducted  for  the  sake  of  developing  a  priv- 
ileged group,  frankly  known  as  the  governing  class,  competent  to 


EARLY  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  13 

write  "gentleman"  after  its  name.  The  newer  type  of  college  was 
established  with  the  presumable  purpose  of  educating  farmers 
and  mechanics  in  their  own  professions.  But  very  soon  it  be- 
came evident  that  the  great  work  of  the  land  grant  college  was 
not  so  much  educating  more  farmers  as  educating  better  farmers. 
It  was  not  so  much  training  mechanics  by  shop  methods  as  it  was 
developing  the  principles  underlying  the  mechanic  arts.  It  was 
not  so  much  building  up  an  educated  mass  of  people,  good  as  that 
was  in  itself;  it  was  more  the  determination  to  compel  knowledge 
to  solve  for  society  its  most  troublesome  problems,  whether  those 
problems  lay  in  the  field  of  morals,  medicine,  or  law,  on  the  one 
hand,  or  of  farming,  manufacture,  or  business  on  the  other. 

The  clear  result  of  the  earlier  attempts  at  putting  the  Land 
Grant  Act  into  execution  was  the  general  conviction  that  educa- 
tion must  be  put  to  work  and  pose  no  longer  as  an  idle  goddess 
for  worship.  This  all  meant,  therefore,  that  the  time  had  passed 
when  education  was  to  be  regarded  as  something  which  gave  one 
individual  an  advantage  over  another.  It  was  to  be  regarded 
from  now  on  as  an  agency  of  progress,  as  a  means  of  developing 
not  only  certain  favored  professional  lines  but  every  line  which 
can  be  held  as  of  interest  to  a  civilized  and  rapidly  advancing 
people.  From  that  time  on,  knowledge  and  an  acquaintance  with 
the  facts  of  the  world,  whether  material  or  spiritual,  was  no  longei 
to  belong  to  a  close  corporation, — since  which  time,  we  have  heard 
nothing  more  about  commercialism  as  debasing  education. 

If  the  Morrill  Act  had  done  nothing  else  than  to  have  brought 
these  extremes  together  in  ways  that  should  rationalize  our  edu- 
cational ideals  as  suited  to  a  democracy,  it  would  have  been  worth 
many  times  all  it  has  cost,  both  in  money  and  in  the  exercise  of 
brain  tissue. 

These  early  disciples  of  the  new  education,  however,  under- 
took a  most  difficult  contract.  It  was  nothing  less  than  an  en- 
deavor to  develop  out  of  the  materials  of  agriculture,  on  the  one 
hand,  and  mechanics,  on  the  other,  courses  of  instruction  that 
might  be  ranked  as  of  college  grade.  Of  course  it  lay  in  the  situa- 
tion that  the  first  attempts  were  crude  and  the  results  anything 
but  satisfactory.  It  was  science  that  led  the  way  in  developing 
new  values  in  the  field  of  knowledge,  for  in  many  lines,  particu- 
larly chemistry,  developments  came  rapidly  and  their  usefulness 
both  outside  and  within  the  field  of  agriculture  became  early 
apparent. 

It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  in  the  attempt  to  develop 
courses  of  collegiate  grade  out  of  the  materials  of  agriculture,  for 
example,  the  pendulum  tended  strongly  to  swing  in  the  opposite 


i4  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

direction  from  that  maintained  by  the  classicist,  and  many  a  dis- 
ciple of  the  new  education  felt  called  upon  to  decry  the  old,  with 
especial  emphasis  on  Latin,  the  symbol  to  him  of  all  uselessness. 

In  many  institutions  the  courses  of  study  that  were  devel- 
oped practically  ignored  the  old  and  attempted  to  build  up  some- 
thing entirely  new.  The  attempt  succeeded  fairly  well,  so  far 
as  the  sciences  were  concerned,  but  difficulties  were  met  within 
the  technical  field  of  agriculture  itself.  Teachers  were  few  and  ill- 
trained;  they  had  little  knowledge  of  the  sciences,  and  less  of  the 
classics;  they  were  not  scholars  in  any  proper  sense  of  the  term. 

Then  arose  the  fallacious  assumption  that  we  needed  no 
specialized  courses  because  an  educated  man  could  do  anything, 
a  fallacy  soon  exploded  and  mainly  by  the  fact  that  we  had  long 
recognized  the  need  of  educating  the  physician  somewhat  differ- 
ently from  the  lawyer.  This  conviction  held  us  to  the  problem  of 
working  out  industrial  courses. 

In  many  states  the  land  grant  had  been  taken  over  by  the 
university,  which  attempted  to  satisfy  the  conditions  of  the  law 
by  electing  a  professor  of  agriculture  to  the  faculty  and  laying 
out  on  paper  an  agricultural  course  with  two  years  of  preparation 
in  the  arts  and  sciences.  Students  entered  these  courses  somewhat 
freely  but  most  of  them  left  at  the  end  of  the  second  year,  those 
who  remained  quickly  reacting  against  the  anticlimax  of  one  pro- 
fessor attempting  to  teach  so  great  a  subject  as  all  agriculture  in 
the  junior  and  senior  years,  after  the  students  had  been  exposed 
for  four  semesters  to  the  best  thought  and  best  teaching  of  both 
classical  and  scientific  subjects  afforded  by  the  institution. 

Briefly  put,  it  must  be  frankly  admitted  that  the  early  at- 
tempts to  teach  both  agriculture  and  the  mechanic  arts  were 
attempts  to  teach  the  art  rather  than  the  science  that  underlay 
the  practice.  Engineering  succeeded  better  than  agriculture  be- 
cause shop  practice  lends  itself  better  to  the  college  curriculum 
than  does  the  art  of  farming.  Methods  of  handling  wood,  steel, 
and  iron  are  practically  the  same  in  all  the  states  of  the  Union; 
but  methods  of  raising  corn  or  wheat,  and  of  feeding  hogs  or  cattle 
vary  marvelously  with  the  locality,  the  season,  and  the  customs 
of  the  people.  Gradually,  therefore,  we  came  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  art  of  farming  is  not  teachable,  at  least  in  courses  of 
college  grade. 

And  now  we  come  to  the  most  significant  turning  point  in  the 
history  of  education  and  the  most  fundamental  issue  that  devel- 
oped out  of  the  Land  Grant  Act  or  any  other  experience  in  the 
field  of  knowledge.  It  was  the  conviction  on  the  part  of  some 
of  the  progressive  teachers  that  the  scientific  basis  did  not  then 


EARLY  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  15 

exist  for  developing  out  of  the  materials  of  agriculture  courses  that 
would  satisfy  the  student  or  that  could  be  properly  reckoned  as 
of  college  grade. 

With  this  conviction  came  movement,  for  the  disciples  of  the 
new  education  were  nothing  if  not  bold  and  progressive.  In  1887 
they  went  back  to  Congress  saying:  We  have  tried  for  twenty-five 
years  to  administer  these  new  colleges  set  up  under  the  Land 
Grant  Act  of  1862.  We  have  endeavored  industriously  to  educate 
farmers  and  artisans  and  we  have  failed  because  of  the  lack  of  a 
sufficient  number  of  well  established  facts  on  which  to  base  our 
instruction.  It  is  now  manifest  that  education  in  agriculture  must 
follow  the  lines  of  science  rather  than  those  of  the  classics.  That 
is  to  say,  we  must  become  disciples  of  the  inductive  method  of 
study.  We  must  teach  principles  rather  than  practices.  We  can- 
not deduce  the  principles  on  which  farm  practice  must  rest  until 
we  know  somewhat  fully  the  facts  and  the  forces  that  underly 
the  activities  of  soil,  climate,  crops,  and  animals. 

It  was  this  admission  on  the  part  of  a  few  early  advocates 
of  the  new  education;  it  was  this  confession  of  failure;  it  was  this 
announcement  of  their  conviction  as  to  what  was  needed  that  led 
Congress  in  1887  to  pass  the  so-called  Hatch  Act,  establishing  in 
every  agricultural  college  what  was  denominated  an  experiment 
station,  whose  business  it  should  be  to  conduct  such  lines  of  in- 
vestigation as  would  tend  to  bring  out  the  facts  with  which 
farmers  must  reckon  and  the  principles  upon  which  they  must 
base  successful  practice. 

It  is  with  a  conscious  feeling  of  restraint  that  I  attempt  to 
put  in  words  my  own  conviction  of  the  sweeping  and  the  far- 
reaching  results  of  this  particular  legislation.  It  was  the  first 
official  act  of  any  legislative  body  on  record  to  recognize  the  funda- 
mental need  of  research  and  to  provide  the  means  for  insuring  its 
realization. 

In  all  the  earlier  experiences  of  teaching,  we  had  relied  upon 
the  philosopher  and  the  literateur  for  the  things  that  should  be 
taught.  We  were  very  much  dependent  upon  authority  and  fol- 
lowed it  with  unquestioned  obedience.  But  science  had  pointed 
out  that  men  are  frequently  mistaken  in  their  guesses  and  that 
the  only  safety  in  deduction  lay  first  in  establishing  our  premises 
by  inductive  methods.  It  would  take  more  time  than  we  have 
at  our  disposal  simply  to  record  the  failures,  the  mistakes,  and 
the  utterly  absurd  antics  which  characterized  the  first  attempts 
of  this  new  system  of  experiment  stations.  As  institutions  had 
not  been  able  to  provide  competent  professors  of  agriculture,  they 
were  certainly  not  equipped  with  investigators. 


16  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

But  slowly,  gradually,  and  with  much  pain,  truth  began  to 
make  itself  manifest  and  what  was  more  to  the  purpose,  the 
spirit  of  the  times  was  radically  changed,  and  in  a  way  that  has 
meant  far  more  to  education  than  the  most  optimistic  of  us  can 
understand. 

That  is  to  say,  that  with  all  their  mistakes  and  shortcomings, 
it  did  not  take  the  experiment  station  people  long  to  demonstrate 
to  farmers  that  there  were  some  fields  of  knowledge  which  scient- 
ists could  attack  but  which  were  hidden  away  from  the  plow. 
You  cannot  analyze  fertilizer  with  ordinary  spectacles.  You  can- 
not study  bacteria  with  a  pitch  fork.  You  cannot  control  disease 
by  building  fences.  You  cannot  cure  it  as  our  grandfathers  used 
to  cure  hollow  horn  and  wolf  in  the  tail.  Gradually  farmers 
learned  that  wheat  would  not  turn  to  chess  even  when  winter 
killed,  and  that  it  was  vastly  more  important  to  pay  some  atten- 
tion to  the  seed  bed,  particularly  with  reference  to  the  physical 
character  of  the  soil  than  it  was  to  consult  the  various  phases  of 
the  moon. 

The  result  was  first  of  all,  that  whereas  for  twenty-five  years 
the  colleges  of  agriculture  had  labored  industriously  but  unsuc- 
cessfully, had  been  ignored  by  the  farmers  and  ridiculed  by  the 
educators,  they  now  found  themselves  in  possession  of  the  most 
powerful  weapon  ever  known  to  the  teacher;  that  is  to  say,  a  col- 
lection of  newly  discovered  facts  for  the  most  part  fairly  well 
established  even  if  they  were  few  and  far  between. 

The  first  effect  of  this  was  to  attract  the  favorable  attention 
of  farmers.  The  second  effect  was  to  fill  up  the  agricultural 
courses  with  students.  The  third  effect  was  to  impress  serious 
minded  educators,  particularly  those  in  scientific  lines.  The  next 
effect  was  to  modify  and  ameliorate  the  attitude  of  mind  even  of 
the  narrowest  classicist,  and  the  old  and  the  new  began  for  the 
first  time  to  come  together  and  talk  the  matter  over. 

Finally,  with  the  coming  of  research  into  the  field  of  agricul- 
ture, and  later  to  some  extent  into  the  field  of  engineering,  these 
two  subjects  became  attractive  to  the  universities  of  the  country. 
Then  it  was  that  we  as  a  people  entered  for  the  first  time  in  our 
educational  history  upon  what  might  be  called  rational  policies 
to  be  evolved  by  the  needs  of  a  people,  as  they  must  be  evolved 
in  a  democracy  if  it  is  to  live  and  maintain  a  free  government. 

Up  to  this  time  agriculture  and  to  some  extent  engineering 
under  the  head  of  mechanics  had  languished  in  the  narrowly  tech- 
nical institutions,  or  else  existed  in  a  moribund  condition  in  the 
so-called  state  universities.  The  new  idea  now  sprang  into  life 
and  intense  activity;  and  whereas  in  the  earlier  days  it  was  the 
separated  colleges,  like  Michigan  and  Massachusetts,  that  bore 


EARL Y  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  17 

the  brunt  of  pioneer  efforts,  when  the  teaching  of  agriculture  was 
an  art  rather  than  a  science,  it  was  the  universities  now  that  gave 
instant  and  able  attention  to  the  whole  new  field  of  applied 
science.  Once  started  in  the  good  work,  the  universities  went 
almost  pell  mell  forward.  They  accepted  not  only  agriculture 
and  engineering  but  every  other  form  of  public  interest,  whether 
spiritual  or  material.  The  new  idea  proved  a  veritable  elixir  of  life 
to  those  institutions  which  came  to  feel  it  incumbent  upon  them- 
selves to  serve  not  only  the  students  that  registered  for  their 
classes  but  in  every  way  to  accept  and  fill  a  real  obligation  for  the 
public  welfare,  particularly  through  the  medium  of  research. 

I  would  not  claim  too  much  for  agriculture,  but  I  would  claim 
this:  That  it  was  the  interest  of  farming  and  it  was  the  agricul- 
tural college  working  alone  under  the  most  discouraging  condi- 
tions that  first  made  clear  the  indispensable  need  for  research 
into  the  material  world  as  a  means  not  only  of  advancing  but  of 
preserving  the  civilization  which  has  already  been  begun. 

With  this  newer  aspect  of  education,  with  this  new  vision  of 
the  duty  of  an  institution  that  functions  in  the  field  of  education, 
with  this  relation  to  the  public,  with  this  obligation  to  solve  its 
problems  so  far  as  scientific  method  can  permit,  came  a  new 
feeling  and  obligation  on  the  part  of  the  public  toward  the  insti- 
tutions of  higher  learning.  Whereas  in  the  beginning  the  colleges 
had  devoted  themselves  to  the  business  of  fitting  out  a  few  men 
with  exceptional  advantages  over  their  fellows  and  had  been  sup- 
ported by  charity,  they  now  were  devoting  their  activities  to  the 
attempt  to  solve  all  the  problems  of  society,  so  far  as  the  solution 
lay  within  the  field  of  research.  The  public  instantly  responded, 
responded  with  funds,  responded  with  sympathy,  responded  with 
such  help  as  never  before  had  favored  any  attempts  at  education. 

And  now  the  time  has  fairly  come  when  public  welfare  is  rec- 
ognized not  only  as  the  basis  of  all  higher  education  but  as  the 
justification  of  its  support  out  of  the  purses  of  all  the  people,  and 
research  is  its  slogan — research  not  only  into  the  practical  affairs 
of  life,  research  not  only  into  the  material  world  that  lies  about 
us  and  out  of  which  we  extract  not  only  our  life  but  much  of  its 
possibilities,  but  research  also  and  creative  activity  in  the  finer 
things  of  the  spirit  whereby  we  shall  grow  in  grace  as  the  ages 
come  and  go. 

The  day  has  passed  therefore  when,  at  least  in  a  state  insti- 
tution, the  individual  student  can  assume  that  the  college  exists 
primarily  for  him  and  his  kind.  The  university  is  now  recognized 
to  exist  primarily  as  an  agent  for  inquiry  into  the  hidden  mysteries 
of  nature,  material  and  spiritual,  for  setting  the  world's  stock  of 


1 8  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

knowledge  in  order  so  that  it  may  serve  this,  that,  or  the  other 
interest  of  society,  whether  material,  moral,  or  spiritual,  and  inci- 
dentally for  giving  instruction  to  such  students  as  may  attend. 

The  prime  purpose  in  education  in  these  days  is  research  and 
service,  and  the  old  aim  of  instruction,  though  it  has  lost  none  of 
its  importance,  no  longer  carries  the  emphasis,  now  being  regarded 
as  secondary,  at  least  from  the  standpoint  of  support  and  expense. 
It  is  not  too  much,  I  think,  to  lay  claim  to  the  assumption 
that  this  new  aspect  of  education,  this  new  relation  on  the  part 
of  the  public,  and  this  new  means  of  support  is  mainly  due,  though 
not  exclusively,  to  the  natural  working  out  of  the  provisions  of  the 
Land  Grant  Act  of  1862. 

It  used  to  be  assumed  that  these  Land  Grant  colleges  aiming 
to  serve  all  the  people  must  necessarily  operate  as  low  grade  in- 
stitutions. The  fears  have  not  been  justified:  quite  the  contrary. 
It  is  true  that  the  Land  Grant  College  is  obliged  to  connect 
itself  with  the  public  system  and  must  occasionally  admit  a  poor 
student,  but  it  is  not  compelled  to  keep  him.  And  experience 
shows  that  the  Land  Grant  College  does  not  retain  its  poor  stu- 
dents even  so  generally  as  do  others  for  the  very  good  reason  that 
free  tuition  means  that  every  student  is  a  financial  liability  rather 
than  an  asset. 

There  remains  to  mention  one  phase  of  this  new  movement, 
the  whole  meaning  of  which  has  not  yet  appeared.  It  will  be 
remembered  in  a  critical  reading  of  the  Morrill  Act  that  these 
new  colleges  were  to  be  a  peculiar  kind  of  hybrid,  fathered  by 
the  federal  government,  mothered  by  the  state,  and  nourished 
wherever  nourishment  could  be  found. 

The  fact  that  so  many  of  them  lived  so  long  upon  so  little 
food  is  prima  facie  evidence  of  the  gift  of  immortality  that  must 
have  been  theirs  from  the  beginning. 

But  like  many  another  youngster  born  under  hard  conditions 
and  fighting  for  its  life,  the  Land  Grant  University  of  today,  at 
least  in  the  most  favored  states,  has  become  a  robust  youngster. 
It  is  but  a  youngster  yet  in  the  educational  field,  to  be  sure,  but 
it  has  brought  along  more  problems,  accepted  more  responsibili- 
ties, and  is  charged  with  more  hope  and  future  prospects  than  any 
of  its  older  brethren. 

This  makes  it  all  the  more  necessary  to  take  stock  from  time 
to  time  as  to  the  shaping  of  its  policies.  All  of  these  Land  Grant 
institutions  have  accepted  not  only  the  first  two  grants  which  have 
been  specifically  mentioned,  but  other  and  succeeding  grants  from 
the  Federal  treasury,  each  with  various  and  varying  conditions, 
which  have  been  accepted  along  with  the  money  appropriated. 


EARLY  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  19 

Even  so,  the  great  means  of  support  of  the  Land  Grant  insti- 
tutions are  the  states  in  which  they  are  situated.  It  is  the  com- 
monwealths whose  citizens  they  directly  serve,  whose  problems 
they  held  to  solve,  and  whose  sons  and  daughters  they  help  to 
educate.  Here  then  we  have  a  kind  of  double  system  of  allegiance 
and  support,  a  Federal  and  a  local,  and  nothing  is  more  important 
than  the  relations  between  these  two  agencies  of  progress. 

Just  what  is  to  come  of  it,  just  what  shall  be  their  mutual 
duties  and  responsibilities,  federal  and  state,  yet  remains  in  many 
respects  to  be  evolved.  The  other  questions  that  have  arisen 
in  connection  with  the  new  ideals  created  by  Federal  legislation 
are,  it  seems  to  me,  fairly  well  settled,  and  nothing  but  promise 
looms  ahead,  provided  the  states  will  squarely  meet  their  obliga- 
tions and  the  Federal  member  of  the  educational  partnership  will 
confine  itself  to  questions  and  issues  of  national  or  at  least  of  re- 
gional import. 

We  have  not  pogrressed  so  very  far  with  respect  to  the  state 
and  federal  relations,  but  we  are  moving  ahead,  and  if  we  may 
judge  the  future  by  the  past,  if  we  may  predict  that  our  successors 
will  be  as  faithful  and  honest  as  ourselves,  and  we  dare  not  do 
otherwise,  then  we  may  look  with  confidence  to  the  future  of  the 
land  grant  institutions.  They  have  certainly  passed  the  experi- 
mental and  controversial  stages  and  would  seem  to  have  left  be- 
hind them  most  of  the  evils  that  all  young  things  fall  heir  to. 


REVIEW  OF  RECENT  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION 
ON  EDUCATION 

By  Samuel  P.  Capen,  Director  of  the  American 
Council  on  Education 

9J>S  AY  I  preface  the  discussion  of  the  subject  assigned 
me  by  a  brief  work  of  greeting?  The  American 
Council  on  Education  through  me  offers  its  felici- 
tations to  President  Kinley  and  its  congratulations 
to  the  University  of  Illinois  on  this  important  oc- 
casion in  the  life  of  the  University.  President 
Kinley's  contacts  with  educational  activities  in  all  parts  of  the 
country  have  been  manifold.  Many  of  us  who  are  delegates  to 
this  conference  have  worked  with  him  either  in  that  field  of  sci- 
ence in  which  he  is  a  recognized  leader,  or  in  one  or  more  of  the 
larger  national  movements  for  the  promotion  of  higher  education. 
We  have  found  him  a  wise  and  suggestive  counselor — even  when 
we  did  not  agree  with  him — always  refreshingly  unorthodox,  and 
absolutely  fearless.  There  never  was  a  time  when  the  universi- 
ties of  the  country  had  more  urgent  need  of  precisely  these  qual- 
ities in  their  leaders.  The  University  of  Illinois  is  especially  fortu- 
nate in  having  President  Kinley's  stimulating  and  virile  guidance 
during  this  difficult  period  of  national  readjustment. 

The  history  of  the  Federal  Government's  participation  in  the 
educational  affairs  of  the  country  may  be  divided  into  two  periods. 
The  first  was  one  hundred  and  twenty-six  years  long,  the  second 
has  been  something  less  than  eight.  From  the  time  of  the  adop- 
tion of  the  Constitution  down  to  19 14  the  policy  of  the  Federal 
Government  with  respect  to  education  was  perfectly  consistent. 
Education  was  regarded  as  a  function  of  the  states,  not  in  any 
sense  a  function  of  the  National  Government.  Occasionally  the 
Government  made  grants  to  the  states  for  the  promotion  of  edu- 
cation. During  the  first  hundred  years  of  the  nation's  life  all  of 
these  grants  were  land  grants,  culminating  in  those  famous  grants 
which  established  the  colleges  of  agriculture  and  mechanic  arts. 
Thereafter  from  time  to  time  the  Federal  Government  made  con- 
tinuing appropriations  for  the  maintenance  of  the  colleges  so  estab- 
lished. These  now  amount  to  a  respectable  annual  income  for 
each  of  the  colleges  of  agriculture  and  mechanic  arts.  But  Fed- 
eral supervision  of  activities  carried  on  by  funds  derived  from 
grants  of  land,  or  from  annual  appropriations  made  prior  to  19 14, 
was  not  provided  for.     In  other  words  it  was  the  policy  of  the 

20 


RECENT  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  21 

Federal  Government  to  stimulate  desirable  educational  activities 
within  the  states,  but  never  to  direct  them  or  even  negatively  to 
exercise  control  over  them. 

This  policy  was  reinforced  by  the  character  of  the  agencies 
which  the  Government  set  up  to  deal  with  its  concerns  in  the 
educational  field.  The  Bureau  of  Education,  the  Government's 
principal  education  office,  was  charged  with  the  collection  and 
dissemination  of  information.  It  had  no  administrative  powers. 
Other  offices  subsequently  created  to  look  after  the  educational 
interests  of  special  departments  of  the  Government  were  of  a 
similar  character.  The  powers  granted  to  them  were  not  such  as 
to  violate  the  Government's  traditional  policy  of  non-interference. 

The  passage  of  the  Smith-Lever  Act  in  1914,  providing  for 
cooperative  agricultural  extension,  marked  the  beginning  of  a  de- 
parture from  this  policy.  The  beginning  was  small  and  incon- 
spicuous. Because  the  Smith-Lever  Act  did  not  affect  the  regu- 
larly organized  work  of  educational  institutions  it  was  not  at  first 
generally  identified  as  an  important  educational  measure.  You 
will  recall  that  the  Smith-Lever  Act  makes  large  continuing  appro- 
priations to  the  states  for  agricultural  extension  to  be  carried  on 
cooperatively  by  the  colleges  of  agriculture  and  mechanic  arts  and 
the  United  States  Department  of  Agriculture.  In  order  to  secure 
its  allotment  of  Government  money  each  state  must  match  the 
Federal  appropriation  by  an  equal  sum  raised  from  local  sources. 
By  implication  the  act  also  places  in  the  hands  of  the  Federal  Gov- 
ernment determinative  power  with  respect  to  the  way  in  which 
the  joint  appropriations  are  to  be  spent.  It  states:  "that  the 
work  shall  be  carried  on  in  such  manner  as  may  be  mutually 
agreed  upon  by  the  Secretary  of  Agriculture  and  State  Agri- 
cultural College"  and  provides  further  that  "before  the  funds . . . 
appropriated  shall  become  available  to  any  college  for  any  fiscal 
year  plans  for  the  work  to  be  carried  on... shall  be  submitted 
by  the  proper  officials  of  each  college  and  approved  by  the  Sec- 
retary of  Agriculture,"  Almost  immediately  the  Department  of 
Agriculture  developed  a  large  administrative  bureau  and  a  super- 
visory field  force  to  enable  it  to  comply  with  these  provisions. 

The  Smith-Lever  Act  was  one  of  the  most  portentous  acts 
ever  passed  by  Congress.  It  not  only  inaugurated  a  new  kind  of 
government  procedure  in  the  field  of  education.  It  embodied, 
unless  I  am  mistaken,  the  first  provision  for  financial  cooperation 
between  the  Federal  Government  and  the  states  on  the  dollar  for 
dollar  basis.  This  fiscal  device  fell  upon  sore-beset  legislators  as 
manna  from  Heaven.  Almost  over  night  it  rose  to  the  dignity  of 
a  principle.     As  a  political  measure  the  device  was  a  stroke  of 


22  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

genius.  It  had  the  double  advantage  of  taking  the  curse  off  large 
Federal  appropriations  and  of  making  the  home  districts  believe 
they  were  receiving  presents  from  the  Government.  Of  equally 
magical  quality  was  the  euphemistic  phrase  "cooperation  with  the 
states."  It  has  become  an  irresistible  slogan.  A  legislative  pro- 
posal designed  to  remedy  any  social  defect  by  the  expenditure  of 
Federal  money  needs  only  to  carry  the  potent  clause,  "for  cooper- 
ation with  the  states,"  to  secure  the  enthusiastic  endorsement  of 
almost  any  organized  body  of  citizens. 

But  the  principle  of  so-called  cooperative  appropriations 
wholly  or  partly  under  Federal  control  has  never  been  subjected 
to  critical  scrutiny.  Has  the  country  had  sufficient  experience 
with  such  measures  to  warrant  a  judgment  concerning  the  wisdom 
of  the  policy  which  they  embody?  Let  us  examine  those  that 
deal  with  education. 

It  is,  of  course,  well  known  that  great  benefits  have  come 
through  the  promotion  of  agricultural  extension  under  the  Smith- 
Lever  Act.  The  act  has  been  on  the  whole  sympathetically  and 
tactfully  administered  and  there  has  been  no  marked  discontent 
at  Federal  interference  among  those  that  the  law  affects.  Evi- 
dences of  friction,  however,  have  not  been  altogether  wanting. 
Indeed  if  the  act  had  stood  alone  the  desirability  of  this  method 
of  fostering  an  educational  movement  might  never  have  been 
questioned. 

But  within  three  years  the  Smith-Lever  Act  was  followed  by 
the  Smith-Hughes  Act  for  Vocational  Education.  This  measure 
provided  for  the  annual  appropriation  of  still  larger  sums  of  Federal 
money  to  be  matched  by  state  or  local  levies,  the  combined  ap- 
propriations to  be  used  for  vocational  training  in  public  secondary 
schools  and  for  the  training  of  vocational  teachers.  It  also  created 
an  independent  Federal  Board  to  administer  appropriations.  The 
Act  imposed  specific  and  exacting  conditions  upon  the  states  in 
the  use  of  Federal  funds.  Moreover  all  state  programs  of  train- 
ing, including  proposed  courses  of  study  and  methods  of  instruc- 
tion, must  be  submitted  to  the  Federal  Board  for  Vocational  Ed- 
ucation for  approval.  The  government  agency  was  thus  clothed 
with  comprehensive  powers.  The  history  of  the  relations  of  the 
Government  with  local  educational  authorities  in  the  administra- 
tion of  the  Vocational  Education  Act  is  familiar  to  every  student 
of  education.  Difficulties  and  dissentions  have  been  common. 
Again  it  is  only  fair  to  say  that  these  may  not  have  offset  the 
benefits  derived  from  the  act  but  they  furnish  an  unhappy  con- 
trast to  the  harmonious  development  of  the  colleges  of  agriculture 
and  mechanic  arts  under  a  different  Federal  dispensation. 


RECENT  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  23 

It  is  also  worth  while  to  note  in  passing  that  the  Vocational 
Education  Act  contributed  still  further  to  the  disorganization  of 
the  Government's  own  educational  activities.  By  this  act  voca- 
tional education  was  recognized  as  a  thing  apart  and  a  separate 
government  office  was  established  to  care  for  it.  Whether  one 
approves  of  fifty-fifty  appropriations,  or  of  intimate  Government 
supervision  of  local  educational  undertakings,  or  not,  I  think  it 
will  be  generally  admitted  that  the  organic  separation  of  the  ma- 
chinery for  vocational  education  from  the  rest  of  the  Govern- 
ment's educational  effort  was  peculiarly  unfortunate. 

Twice  again  within  the  last  year  and  a  half  Congress  has 
entered  the  fringe  of  the  educational  field  with  measures  precisely 
similar  in  fundamental  policy  to  the  Smith-Hughes  Act.  The  Act 
for  Industrial  Rehabilitation  passed  in  1920  appropriates  money 
to  the  states  for  the  vocational  rehabilitation,  through  training, 
of  persons  injured  in  industry.  The  appropriations  are  made  on 
almost  identical  terms  with  the  appropriations  for  vocational  ed- 
ucation and  they  are  administered  by  the  Federal  Board  for 
Vocational  Education. 

Finally  in  the  closing  days  of  the  session  which  has  just  ad- 
journed the  Maternity  Bill  became  a  law.  The  educational  impli- 
cations of  this  measure  are  less  direct,  but  the  now  familiar  prin- 
ciple once  more  appears  in  its  full  integrity.  There  are  dollar 
for  dollar  appropriations  and  Government  approval  of  state 
projects.  The  bill  also  brings  into  being  a  new  board  and  confers 
upon  still  another  bureau — this  time  the  Children's  Bureau — 
authority  over  local  educational  efforts. 

Let  us  now  see  where  we  are.  It  is  apparent  that  extraordi- 
narily rapid  progress  has  been  made  in  the  development  of  this 
new  cooperative  policy  in  the  short  space  of  seven  years.  Four 
important  educational  measures  have  been  passed,  three  of  which 
open  up  new  fields  of  educational  activity  to  joint  Government 
and  state  exploitation.  The  Federal  appropriations  made  under 
these  acts  increase  annually  for  a  period  of  years.  When  the 
maximum  is  reached  the  Federal  Government  will  be  spending  a 
little  over  fifteen  million  dollars  a  year  on  the  enterprise  in  ques- 
tion. It  is  interesting  to  compare  these  expenditures  with  the 
Federal  expenditures  for  the  colleges  of  agriculture  and  mechanic 
arts.  After  fifty  years  the  Federal  Government  spends  on  the 
sixty-eight  land-grant  colleges  for  instruction  and  experimenta- 
tion approximately  three  and  a  half  million  dollars  annually.  In 
this  audience  and  at  this  University  it  would  be  superfluous  to 
comment  on  the  far-reaching  influence  over  all  higher  and  second- 
ary education  that  has  emanated  from  the  colleges  of  agriculture 
and  mechanic  arts.     No  serious  disagreements  have  marred  the 


24  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

relations  of  these  land-grant  colleges  with  the  Government,  except 
such  as  have  arisen  over  the  conduct  of  extension  work  of  voca- 
tional education  since  1904.  Constant  and  increasing  friction,  on 
the  other  hand,  has  attended  the  Government's  efforts  in  those 
other  fields  that  we  have  been  discussing.  The  work  of  individual 
institutions  has  been  warped  and  distorted.  Local  state  officers 
have  been  subjected  to  continual  irritation. 

Nevertheless,  Congress,  and  what  might  be  called  the  uplift 
lobby,  are  undaunted.  The  principle  of  fifty-fifty  cooperative  ap- 
propriations so  far  from  being  seriously  questioned  is  now  the 
accepted  formula  for  all  important  measures  designed  to  affect 
education.  My  subject  does  not  include  pending  legislation  but 
I  may  perhaps  be  pardoned  if  I  allude  briefly  to  certain  of  the 
important  bills  now  before  Congress. 

There  is  first  of  all  the  Towner-Sterling  Bill  which  provides 
for  the  creation  of  a  Department  of  Education  and  authorizes  the 
appropriation  of  one  hundred  million  dollars  a  year  to  cooperate 
with  the  states  in  curing  the  most  patent  defects  in  our  educa- 
tional system.  The  framers  of  this  measure  have,  to  be  sure,  been 
warned  by  the  unhappy  episodes  that  have  marked  the  execution 
of  the  Smith-Hughes  Act.  In  the  hope  of  preventing  the  possi- 
bility of  offensive  Federal  dictation  the  bill  specifically  reserves 
to  the  local  authorities  complete  supervision  and  control  of  edu- 
cational activities  carried  on  under  the  joint  appropriations.  Most 
students  of  government,  however,  and  especially  those  who  have 
studied  the  development  of  centralizing  tendencies  in  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  United  States,  believe  that,  in  spite  of  reservations 
to  the  contrary,  a  large  measure  of  Federal  control  will  inevitably 
follow  the  distribution  of  such  considerable  Government  subsi- 
dies. But  whether  the  optimists  or  the  alarmists  are  right  is  for 
the  moment  beside  the  point.  The  Towner-Sterling  Bill  provides 
for  cooperative  national  and  state  appropriations  totaling  two 
hundred  million  dollars. 

The  Fess-Capper  Bill  for  Physical  Education  is  in  one  sense 
a  fractional  part  of  the  Towner-Sterling  Bill.  It  is  designed  to 
establish  a  national  system  of  physical  education  by  cooperative 
appropriations  under  Federal  direction.  Ten  million  dollars  an- 
nually of  Federal  money  is  provided  to  be  matched  by  state  funds. 
Control  of  the  same  drastic  character  as  that  authorized  by  the 
Smith-Hughes  Act  is  vested  in  the  Commissioner  of  Education. 

And  within  the  last  two  years  a  number  of  other  bills  of 
similar  or  identical  construction  intended  to  benefit  public  health, 
or  the  work  of  Americanization,  or  tending  to  promote  some  un- 
orthodox educational  undertaking,  have  been  introduced  in  Con- 
gress.    These  have  been  paralleled  by  measures  affecting  other 


RECENT  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  25 

activities  and  embodying  the  same  principles.  In  this  connection 
it  should  not  be  forgotten  that  the  most  expensive  cooperative 
measure  of  all,  the  Good  Roads  Act,  is  built  on  precisely  the 
same  lines. 

Certain  conclusions  can  now  easily  be  drawn  from  the  ex- 
perience of  the  last  seven  years  with  Federal  legislation  bearing 
on  education.  In  the  first  place  it  is  obvious  that  the  new  type 
of  Federal  law  brings  action  without  delay.  It  buys  action.  No 
such  country-wide  development  of  agricultural  extension  or  voca- 
tional education  could  possibly  have  been  induced  in  this  brief 
period  without  the  combined  pressure  of  Federal  subsidies  and 
Federal  authority.  The  proponents  of  the  measures  already 
passed  and  of  those  still  pending  emphasize  this  fact — and  prop- 
erly. But,  as  has  been  said,  action  is  attended  by  antagonism 
and  resentment  toward  the  Government  on  the  part  of  those  who 
are  by  this  means  induced  to  act.  This  is  an  equally  important 
fact  and  must  be  faced. 

In  the  second  place,  the  measures  that  have  been  discussed 
have  already  radically  altered  the  long-accepted  relationship  be- 
tween the  Federal  Government  and  the  states.  The  Federal  Gov- 
ernment previously  entered  the  states  only  in  the  interests  of 
national  defense  and  for  the  protection  of  life  and  property. 
Through  these  recent  acts  it  now  exercises  control  in  other  fields. 
To  that  extent  the  autonomy  of  the  states  has  been  curtailed.  But 
the  autonomy  of  the  states  is  not  curtailed  merely  by  bureaucratic 
orders  from  Washington.  There  is  another  still  more  important 
influence.  Already  a  very  considerable  portion  of  state  revenues 
is  claimed  for  purposes  designated  by  the  Federal  Government. 
Let  the  principle  which  we  have  been  discussing  continue  to  dom- 
inate Federal  legislation  for  a  decade  or  two  longer  and  the  major 
part  of  all  state  tax  levies  will  be  mortgaged  in  advance  for  the 
support  of  undertakings  determined  at  Washington.  By  a  grad- 
ual and  unsuspected  process  of  transition  the  respective  functions 
of  the  Federal  and  state  governments  will  have  been  changed. 
This  is  what  fiscal  cooperation  with  the  states  on  the  fifty-fifty 
basis,  Smith-Lever,  Smith-Hughes,  Sterling-Towner  cooperation, 
really  means. 

Do  we  want  it?  Perhaps  we  do.  But  whether  we  do  or  not, 
let  us  recognize  it.  Let  us  examine  every  proposed  piece  of  legis- 
lation embodying  provisions  for  financial  cooperation  with  full 
consciousness  of  what  its  passage  implies. 

Now  if  some  of  the  persons  here  present  do  wish  to  see  the 
Government  continue  this  method  of  participation  in  American 
education.  I  am  frank  to  say  that  I  do  not.  In  closing  I  should 
like  to  define  what  I  believe  to  be  the  Government's  legitimate 


26  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

and  fruitful  function  in  the  conduct  of  the  nation's  educational 
enterprise.  This  function  is  clearly  revealed  by  the  old  and  the 
new  experiments  in  the  promotion  of  the  intellectual  interests  of 
the  country. 

The  Government  of  the  United  States  is  engaged  in  two  dis- 
tinct kinds  of  national  service.  The  first  is  defensive  or  conserva- 
tive, the  second  is  creative.  Under  the  defensive  service  of  the 
Govrnment  are  properly  grouped  all  those  ancient  activities  re- 
lating to  the  raising  of  money,  the  administration  of  justice,  pro- 
vision for  military  defense,  postal  communication,  and  the  adjust- 
ment of  foreign  relations.  The  agencies  which  the  Government 
has  devised  to  carry  on  these  activities  are  agencies  of  self-preser- 
vation. Within  the  spheres  in  which  they  operate  they  must  con- 
trol absolutely  the  lives,  the  property,  or  the  conduct  of  citizens, 
else  the  nation's  safety  is  jeopardized.  Back  of  them  lies  the  full 
physical  force  of  the  Government. 

The  second  kind  of  service,  the  creative  service  of  the  Gov- 
ernment, is  of  quite  a  different  character.  In  it  are  included  those 
activities  designed  to  foster  industrial  production,  to  encourage 
scientific  inquiry,  to  promote  social  welfare,  and  to  advance  edu- 
cation. Very  evidently  the  sanction  behind  the  Government's 
promotion  of  these  creative  concerns  of  the  nation  is  not  force. 
It  is  not  even  the  coercive  power  of  subsidies.  What  is  it?  It  is 
persuasion.  This  is  proved  by  reviewing  the  history  of  any  of 
the  government  establishments  for  dealing  with  these  creative 
interests. 

How  did  the  Department  of  Agriculture  effect  a  revolution 
in  the  nation's  basic  industry  in  the  short  space  of  fifty  years? 
Not  by  fiat.  Not  by  the  distribution  of  money.  The  result  was 
achieved  by  knowledge,  ideas,  publicity;  in  other  words,  by  per- 
suasion. And  the  great  subsidies  and  mandatory  laws  that  the 
Department  has  recently  had  to  administer  are  a  misfortune  both 
to  it  and  to  the  interest  that  it  serves,  although  the  Deparment 
may  not  yet  be  aware  of  he  fact. 

Why  has  the  Bureau  of  Education,  with  insignificant  appro- 
priations and  a  shifting  personnel,  had  an  influence  on  American 
education  out  of  all  proportion  to  its  size  and  resources?  Because 
its  task  was  to  investigate  and  promote,  and  because  it  had  no 
administrative  powers.  Commissioners  of  Education  have  occa- 
sionally desired  to  change  this  situation,  but  it  is  fortunate  for 
education  and  for  the  Bureau  that  they  were  unable  to  do  so. 

What  is  the  source  of  the  prestige  of  the  Children's  Bureau? 
Not  its  powers,  for  it  has  had  none;  but  rather  the  accuracy  of 
its  studies  of  sociological  conditions  and  the  validity  of  its  con- 
clusions.   And  now  in  the  last  few  days  there  has  fallen  to  it  the 


RECENT  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  27 

task  of  administering  the  subsidies  carried  by  the  Maternity  Bill 
and  so  of  exercising  control  in  the  field  in  which  it  has  previously 
furnished  inspiration  alone.  In  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  Chil- 
dren's Bureau  was  eager  to  get  these  subsidies,  it  is  now  really 
an  object  of  commiseration. 

The  lesson  of  the  Government's  experience  in  dealing  with 
the  creative  interests  of  the  nation  is  plain.  These  interests  flour- 
ish if  furnished  with  ideas,  intellectual  guidance,  leadership.  They 
suffer  if  subjected  to  control.  The  ancient  policy  of  non-interfer- 
ence— which  probably  was  adopted  and  persevered  in  largely  by 
accident  and  which  was  finally  altered  without  full  realization 
of  what  the  alteration  entailed — was  the  right  policy. 

By  far  the  greatest  and  most  important  of  the  creative  inter- 
ests of  the  nation  is  education.  What  does  education  need  from 
the  Federal  Government  in  the  future?  It  needs  three  things: 
unification  of  the  Government's  own  educational  enterprise; 
studies  on  a  large  scale  of  the  educational  problems  of  the  coun- 
try; and  leadership.  To  meet  these  needs  there  must  be  a  con- 
solidation of  bureaus  and  offices  at  Washington,  and  a  larger, 
better  supported,  more  influential  establishment;  an  establishment 
that  can  command  the  services  of  the  best  minds  in  the  country. 
Whether  this  establishment  should  be  an  independent  department, 
a  commission,  or  a  division  of  a  department  is  of  secondary  im- 
portance— although  most  of  us  have  our  preferences.  It  is  of  first 
importance  that  the  establishment  be  charged  with  only  those 
functions  which  experience  has  proved  are  helpful  and  vitalizing 
to  American  education  everywhere. 


THE  INSTALLATION 

By  William  L.  Abbott,  President  of  the  Board  of  Trustees 

HE  PRESIDENT  of  a  university  is  the  institution's 
great  hope,  and  the  installations  of  presidents  are 
milestones  marking,  as  no  other  events  can,  the  uni- 
versity's progress.     As  the  president  holds  in  his 
hands,   in   large   measure,   the  success   or   lack  of 
success  of  his  institution,  it  is  imperative  that  the 
selection  of  a  president  be  made  with  deliberation  and  care,  and 
it  is  fitting  that  his  installation  be  celebrated  with  ceremony  and 
felicitation. 

When  President  James's  failing  strength  made  him  ask  to  be 
permanently  relieved  of  his  burden,  he  was  urged  instead  to  spend 
a  year  and  more  in  rest  and  recuperation,  in  the  hope  that  he 
would  then  be  able  to  come  back.  Reluctantly  and  against  his 
judgment,  he  consented  to  make  the  attempt.  His  reluctance  was 
not  so  much  on  his  own  account  as  it  was  for  his  successor,  who 
he  said  should  be  unhampered  by  former  administrative  policies 
and  free  to  formulate  and  follow  his  own. 

President  James  went  away,  and,  in  natural  course,  Vice- 
President  Kinley  succeeded  to  the  presidential  duties  and  carried 
out  scrupulously  the  policies  of  his  principal.  He  discharged  the 
duties  of  the  office  in  such  a  masterly  way  that  when,  several 
months  later,  word  came  that  President  James  would  never  be 
able  to  resume  his  old  position  the  Board  had  already  realized 
that  it  had,  in  the  acting  president,  an  executive  who,  in  addition 
to  his  recognized  scholarly  attainments,  was  possessed  of  high 
administrative  ability  and  qualities  of  leadership  of  rare  presi- 
dential grade.  He  had  already  won  our  admiration  and  esteem, 
and  it  was  our  impulse  to  make  him  President  forthwith;  but, 
fearing  that  it  might  have  been  prejudiced  by  the  endearment  of 
long  association,  the  Board,  in  justice  to  the  University  and  in 
justice  to  Dr.  Kinley  himself,  deferred  action  while  it  sought  far 
and  near  for  someone  available  and  better — nay,  for  someone  the 
equal  of  the  one  it  already  had.  The  Board  searched  conscien- 
tiously for  such  a  man;  it  searched  while  the  faculty  wondered; 
it  searched  while  the  Alumni  murmured;  it  searched  and  found 
him  not.  Dr.  Kinley  was  chosen  president,  and  time  has  verified 
the  wisdom  of  that  choice. 

President  Kinley,  we  are  come  formally  to  install  you  in  the 
high  office  to  which  you  were  long  since  elected.  Before  you 
surges  an  ever  increasing  throng  of  the  flower  of  the  youth  of  this 

28 


INSTALLATION  OF  PRESIDENT  KINLEY  29 

and  other  states  and  nations.  At  your  side,  to  uphold  your  hands, 
stands  a  loyal  and  efficient  staff,  the  equal  of  any  in  the  land. 
Behind  you  is  the  Board  of  Trustees,  whose  only  purpose  is  to 
help  you  to  make  the  most  of  the  opportunities  now  here.  Behind 
the  trustees  is  the  far-flung  line  of  Alumni  at  your  beck  and  call, 
while  back  of  all  are  the  teeming  millions  of  the  State  of  Illinois, 
with  their  increasing  wealth,  increasing  intelligence,  increasing  de- 
sire for  higher  education,  and  increasing  liberality  in  the  support 
of  this   institution. 

Oh,  Illinois,  central  jewel  in  the  diadem  or  Crown  of  Com- 
monwealths, would  that  we  could  pierce  the  veil  of  your  imme- 
diate future  to  gauge  the  magnitude  of  the  obligations  which  that 
future  lays  on  this  generation  and  on  this  institution! 

David  Kinley,  I  now  pronounce  you  formally  installed  as 
President  of  the  University  of  Illinois.  Upon  your  shoulders  we 
place  the  great  responsibility  of  giving  guidance  and  instruction 
in  character  and  knowledge  to  the  throngs  that  will  sit  at  your 
feet  for  a  brief  space  and  then  go  out  to  make  an  impress  upon 
the  state  and  the  nation.  Into  your  hands  is  given  authority 
over  this  great  institution,  with  its  ramified  organizations  and  its 
innumerable  undertakings,  touching  upon  every  phase  of  human 
knowledge,  and  into  your  hands  is  given  the  custody  of  its  physi- 
cal property. 

I  congratulate  you  upon  your  opportunity  for  service  and 
upon  your  ambition  to  serve,  and  may  God  spare  you  and  give 
you  strength  commensurate  with  your  task,  your  courage,  and 
your  zeal. 


PRESIDENT  KIN  LEY'S  RESPONSE 

f&  R.  PRESIDENT,  Board  of  Trustees,  distinguished 
delegates,  colleagues  and  friends:  One  scarcely 
knows  how  to  reply  to  such  an  appeal  and  such 
a  call  other  than  to  say  that,  under  God's  direc- 
tion, I  will  do  the  best  I  can.  I  will  give  all  that 
is  in  me  for  the  furtherance  of  the  great  purpose 
and  the  maintenance  of  the  high  standards  and  the  continuance 
of  the  great  ideas  for  which  this  institution  of  learning  has  been 
established  by  the  people  of  Illinois  and  which,  through  the  years, 
it  has  adhered  to  and  struggled  to  maintain  and  to  advance.  I 
have  been  deeply  touched,  Mr.  President,  by  the  confidence  that 
the  Board  of  Trustees  has  placed  in  me  ever  since  that  afternoon 
in  1919  when  my  dear  friend,  the  dear  friend  of  all  of  us,  said 
that  he  did  not  want  to  go  to  the  baccalaureate  service  or  to  the 
commencement  exercises  and  they  called  me  in  to  see  the  day 
through;  because  President  James  did  not  feel  equal  to  the  task. 
I  have  been  deeply  affected  by  the  loyal  support  that  the  trus- 
tees, faculty,  students,  and  alumni  have  given  me  since  that  time. 
They  have  come  without  solicitation  on  my  part  to  support  the 
policy,  to  help  put  through  the  plans,  to  push  forward  the  meas- 
ures best  for  the  University.  No  man  could  ask  for  or  have  more 
whole-hearted  support  and  help  than  I  have  had  in  the  last  two 
years,  and  I  have  sometimes  wondered  why.  It  was  through  no 
merit  of  mine.  It  has  warmed  my  heart  and  it  has  carried  me 
through  the  dark  hours  to  know  that  you  were  with  me;  and  I 
knew  you  were  doing  your  best  to  create  that  unity  of  spirit, 
purpose,  and  idea  established  here  at  the  University  of  Illinois; 
and  I  can  only  promise,  Mr.  President  and  fellow  members  of 
the  faculty,  that  I  will  try  in  the  future  to  give  the  best  that  is 
in  me  in  order  that  these  purposes  may  still  be  attained. 

In  connection  with  this  installation,  one  thing  I  miss  is  the 
presence  of  my  predecessor.  I  could  not  let  this  occasion  pass 
without  paying  my  personal  tribute  of  affection  and  gratitude  to 
Edmund  James,  whom  I  knew  many  years  before  I  came  here 
and  knew  more  closely  than  any  of  the  rest  of  you  as  he  worked 
among  us.  I  knew  something  of  his  disappointments,  of  his  am- 
bitions, of  his  struggles,  of  his  achievements,  successes,  glory.  He 
had  no  superior  any  where  as  a  President  of  a  great  university, — 
in  personal  character,  scholarly  attainment,  scholarly  achieve- 
ment, administrative  ability,  vision  of  the  future,  great  heart, 
mind,  and  character.  He  gave  them  all  to  you  and  to  me.  I 
wrote  him  and  asked  him  to  come  if  possible,  but  he  said  he 
could  not.  I  know  we  all  miss  him  and  we  all  deplore  the  cause 
of  his  absence. 

30 


THE  RELATION  OF  STATE  AND  NATION  IN 
EDUCATIONAL  POLICY 

By  David  Kinley,  President  of  the  University  of  Illinois 

HE  UNIVERSITY  has  asked  you  to  come  together 
to  discuss  a  question  that  is  before  the  country. 
It  is  a  question  on  which  public  opinion  has  not 
been  sufficiently  aroused,  a  question  on  the  de- 
cision of  which  will  depend  for  many  years  the 
success  of  our  educational  system  and  in  a  con- 
siderable degree  the  future  relations  between  our  state  and 
national  governments.  The  matter  which  we  are  to  consider  in  this 
conference  is  a  question  of  public  policy,  not  of  educational  expedi- 
ency or  advantage.  The  question  is  primarily  a  political  rather  than 
an  educational  one.  It  does  not  rest  for  its  solution  upon  any 
showing  of  the  need  for  increasing  educational  facilities  or  check- 
ing the  spread  of  illiteracy.  There  is  no  difference  of  opinion 
among  us  as  to  the  need  and  desirability  of  doing  these  things 
to  the  utmost  of  our  resources.  Again,  the  question  is  not  whether 
we  should  have  a  Federal  Department  of  Education.  There  is 
room  for  such  a  department  in  any  policy  or  plan  that  has  been 
proposed.  Nor  is  the  question  simply  whether  we  should  have 
Federal  financial  aid  for  education.  The  matter  of  discussion  is 
the  method  of  rendering  financial  aid,  its  reaction  on  the  author- 
ity of  State  and  local  governments,  and  its  influence  in  determin- 
ing the  character  and  scope  of  education.  At  bottom,  the  problem 
is  the  proper  location  of  the  control  of  educational  facilities  and 
standards. 

We  already  have  Federal  intervention  in  State  educational 
matters  in  the  shape  of  Federal  aid.  The  Land  Grant  Act  of 
1862  is,  of  course,  the  basis  of  the  existence  of  all  the  Land  Grant 
Colleges.  The  second  Morrill  Act,  which  follows  the  principle  of 
the  Act  of  1862,  has  been  in  operation  more  than  thirty  years. 
These  Acts  have  made  appropriations  to  the  States,  either  in  the 
form  of  an  endowment  or  of  an  annual  appropriation,  under  cer- 
tain conditions.  The  Federal  government  made  these  appropria- 
tions to  the  States,  leaving  them  to  their  own  discretion  as  to 
ways  and  means  of  carrying  out  the  purpose  of  the  laws  and 
spending  the  money. 

But  some  of  the  educational  bills  which  now  are  attracting 
public  attention  involve  a  different  principle,  as  do  the  Smith- 
Lever  and  the  Smith-Hughes  Acts  under  which  we  have  been 
operating  for  some  time.    It  seems  to  many  of  us  a  wrong  prin- 

31 


32  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

ciple  because  its  operation  tends  to  undermine  local  authority  in 
educational  matters.  Some  of  the  bills  now  under  consideration 
seem  worse  than  the  Lever  and  Hughes  laws,  because  they  extend 
this  wrong  principle  in  a  more  far-reaching  way.  That  principle 
is  the  provision  of  Federal  appropriations  to  States  on  condition 
that  the  States  will  match  the  Federal  appropriations  with  equal 
amounts.  In  its  effect,  it  seems  to  me  to  invade  the  prerogatives 
of  the  State  and  local  authorities,  and  to  contain  the  germ  of  a 
power  that,  when  developed,  will  determine  the  character  and 
extent  of  our  education.  It  seems  to  me  to  have  in  it  the  ultimate 
possibility  of  impairing  the  initiative  and  independence  of  every 
school  district  in  the  country. 

The  current  of  effort  to  bring  the  Federal  government  into 
active  participation  in  educational  affairs  suddenly  became  strong 
within  the  past  few  years.  What  has  already  been  done  in  the 
way  of  interference  with  our  educational  system  by  Washington 
and  what  it  is  proposed  to  do  is  a  remarkable  exhibition.  I  pre- 
sume that  it  is  not  far  out  of  the  way  to  say  that  nearly  one  hun- 
dred bills  and  resolutions  dealing  with  or  touching  on  educational 
matters  have  been  brought  before  Congress  in  the  past  two  or 
three  years.  Some  of  these  are  unimportant,  but  several  involve 
large  issues  of  national  policy.  Scarcely  any  proposal  that  can 
fairly  be  brought  under  the  head  of  education  seems  to  have 
escaped  the  attention  and  ardor  of  the  proponents  of  a  policy  to 
use  the  strong  arm  of  Washington  to  make  us  all  well  informed, 
intelligent,  and  moral.  The  tendency  has  become  so  strong  that 
wisdom  bids  us  pause  to  ask  whither  we  are  tending;  to  deter- 
mine whether,  even  if  we  grant  the  main  principle  of  Federal  aid 
in  education,  we  are  not  now  wandering  into  dangerous  by-ways 
of  policy. 

Dr.  S.  P.  Capen,  the  distinguished  Secretary  of  the  American 
Council  on  Education,  wrote  in  one  of  his  reports  about  a  year 
ago,  as  follows: 

"While  the  control  of  education  is  still  admitted  to  be  the 
function  of  the  States  and  not  of  the  Federal  government,  one 
measure  after  another  has  found  its  way  on  to  the  statute  books 
which  tends  to  break  down  the  integrity  of  this  theory.  By  ac- 
cretion, we  are  getting  a  nationalized  system  of  education,  more 
and  more  influenced,  if  not  actually  controlled  by  the  Federal 
government.  If  we  are  not  on  our  guard,  we  will  find  ourselves 
in  a  position  where  not  only  the  character  of  our  educational  pro- 
cesses, but  immediate  authority  over  them,  and  control  of  the 
means  of  their  support,  will  be  usurped  by  the  Federal  government 
and  put  into  the  hands  of  some  bureau  at  Washington  conducted 
by  men  who  neither  understand  nor  appreciate  the  necessity  of 


INSTALLATION  OF  PRESIDENT  KINLEY  33 

the  human  element  in  education  and  educational  machinery.  In- 
deed, it  is  impossible  for  a  bureaucratic  administration  to  recognize 
the  influence  of  the  human  element.  It  must  work  by  rule  in  a 
machine-like  way.  For  that  reason  there  are  greater  dangers  in 
permitting  the  control  of  our  education  to  pass  into  bureaucratic 
hands  than  of  almost  any  other  department  of  our  life." 

Some  proponents  of  Federal  intervention  in  the  new  way 
ask  for  it  on  the  general  ground  that  the  States  have  failed  to  do 
their  duty  in  the  field  of  education.  They  point  for  proof  to  the 
revelations  of  the  amount  of  illiteracy  shown  in  our  Army  tests, 
although  some  people  think  these  were  exaggerated.  But  it  is 
doubtful  whether  the  failure  of  State  and  local  officers  is,  in  the 
long  run,  any  greater  than  would  be  the  failure  of  Federal  offi- 
cers. Some  urge  that  the  proposals  in  the  bills  now  before  Con- 
gress for  Federal  aid  aim  at  stimulating  State  and  local  authori- 
ties by  offers  of  assistance  to  do  their  duty  better  in  the  future. 
Is  not  that  to  say  that,  because  they  have  failed  under  the  stimu- 
lus of  a  sense  of  public  duty  and  the  obligation  of  citizenship,  we 
will  bribe  them  to  do  their  duty  by  offers  of  money? 

It  may  strike  some  people  as  strange  that  at  the  end  of  the 
first  quarter  of  the  twentieth  century  an  attempt  is  made  to  focus 
the  attention  of  the  public  on  the  importance  of  the  retention 
of  the  autonomy  of  the  States  in  the  important  field  of  education. 
It  may  seem  to  some  an  echo  from  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  Yet  our  constitution  and  laws,  our  political  theories,  our 
history,  all  emphasize  the  importance  we  attach  to  that  autonomy. 
While  the  power  of  the  Federal  government  has  grown  with  on- 
rushing  strides,  our  courts  have  insisted  on  retaining  the  form,  at 
least,  of  the  doctrine  of  constitutional  limitations. 

The  onward  sweep  of  the  growth  of  Federal  power  is  one  of 
the  most  surprising  facts  in  our  history.  Our  forefathers  framed 
a  Constitution  which  they  thought  would  preserve  the  rights  and 
prerogatives  of  the  States,  on  the  one  hand,  and  of  the  Federal 
government,  on  the  other.  It  is  true  that  Congress  still  legislates 
and  the  Federal  courts  still  render  decisions  in  the  language  of  the 
Constitution.  The  fact  is,  however,  that  the  theories  underlying 
these  Federal  actions  and  judicial  decisions  do  not  square  with 
the  practice  of  the  government  and  that  we  are  far  away  in  many 
respects  from  the  ideals  and  purposes  of  the  framers  of  the  Con- 
stitution. 

The  original  concept  of  the  relation  of  the  State  and  Federal 
government  was,  as  we  all  know,  that  the  latter  was  a  govern- 
ment of  expressly  delegated  powers  and  of  such  other  powers  as 
were  necessary  to  the  execution  of  those  expressly  granted.  Fed- 
eral sovereignty,  therefore,  became  a  sovereignty  which  included 


34  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

the  powers  expressly  granted  and  the  powers  implied  by  the  lat- 
ter. But  in  the  minds  of  some  expansionists  this  sovereignty  was 
too  limited.  Therefore  there  has  grown  up  a  new  doctrine,  strange 
to  the  Constitution  and  to  the  intentions  of  its  framers.  It  is  that 
the  Federal  government,  being  a  sovereign  power  in  matters  del- 
egated to  it  by  the  States  and  in  matters  implied  by  this  delega- 
tion, must  also  be  as  much  of  a  sovereign  as  any  other  sovereign 
power  in  the  world,  and,  therefore,  must  have  authority  over  all 
matters  within  the  jurisdiction  of  any  sovereign  power,  since 
sovereignty  could  not  really  be  limited. 

This  doctrine  involves  the  entire  abnegation  of  the  reserved 
rights  of  the  States.  Under  the  influence  of  this  theory  of  sov- 
ereignty and  the  not  uncommon  opinion  that  if  a  thing  is  a  good 
thing  to  do,  it  matters  little  which  one  of  our  agencies  does  it, 
many  things  have  been  done  which  are  good  in  themselves  but 
whose  good  has  been  purchased  at  the  price  of  the  impairment 
of  our  form  of  government.  The  Supreme  Court  has  always  been 
careful  to  draw  the  line  between  State  and  Federal  authority, 
although  it  may  not  always  have  drawn  it  in  the  same  place.  In 
a  decision  as  late  as  1906,  in  Kansas  vs.  Colorado  (U.  S.  206), 
the  Court  gives  expression  to  the  proper  doctrine  in  these  words : 
"But  the  proposition  that  there  are  legislative  powers  affecting 
the  nation  as  a  whole  which  belong  to,  although  not  expressed  in 
the  grant  of  powers,  is  in  direct  conflict  with  the  doctrine  that  this 
is  a  government  of  enumerated  powers."  The  Court  further  states 
that  "the  powers  affecting  the  internal  affairs  of  the  States  not 
granted  to  the  United  States  by  the  Constituion,  nor  prohibited  by 
it  to  the  States,  are  reserved  to  the  States,  respectively." 

Nevertheless,  many  practices  through  many  years  have  estab- 
lished departure  from  the  strict  observance  of  the  doctrine  thus 
expressed  by  the  Court. 

If  we  admit  that  our  departure  from  the  substance  of  gov- 
ernment set  up  in  the  Constitution  is  settled  in  practice,  it  is 
proper  for  anyone  of  us  to  stop  and  question  a  new  proposal  that 
will  lead  us  farther  in  this  same  direction.  In  other  words,  the 
real  question  is  always  the  question  of  advisability,  the  question 
of  policy,  the  question,  "How  far  shall  we  go?"  The  problem 
is  always  to  find  that  happy  balance  between  Federal  and  State 
authority,  between  the  extension  of  any  authority  and  the  devel- 
opment of  the  individual  sense  of  responsibility,  which  will  con- 
serve liberty  in  a  satisfactory  degree  and  at  the  same  time  give 
us  a  reasonably  satisfactory  condition  of  morals  and  welfare. 

We  must  note  that  the  extension  of  Federal  control  does  not 
come  only  from  specific  legislative  enactments.  Such  con- 
trol may  come  from  executive  or  administrative  action.     While 


INSTALLATION  OF  PRESIDENT  KINLEY  35 

the  executive  department  of  our  national  government  was  estab- 
lished to  carry  out  the  wishes  of  the  legislative  branch,  it,  like  the 
legislative  branch,  has  spread    its    power    far  beyond  this  field. 
Illustrations  might  be  given  from  several  different  fields;  but  it  is 
sufficient  for  our  present  purpose  to  illustrate  the  inevitable  growth 
of  administrative  power  by  occurrences  springing  from  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  Federal  educational  laws  already  in  existence. 
Only  recently  the  University  of  Illinois  was  asked  to  take 
part  with  one  of  the  bureaus  of  the  government  in  what  is  com- 
monly called  a  cooperative  scheme    of    research.     The    bureau 
agreed  to  pay  the  cost  of  the  investigation  in  installments,  the 
last  to  be  paid  after  it  was  concluded,  but  was  obliged  by  the 
rulings  of  its  Department  to  require  that  the  publication  of  the 
results  be  by  it.    The  policy  of  the  University  of  Illinois  in  con- 
ducting investigations  for  outside  parties  is  to  require  the  deposit 
of  the  money  in  advance,  and  it  insists  on  control  of  the  results 
and  publication  of  them  by  itself.     Otherwise  it  would  be  in  the 
position  of  incurring  liabilities  for  others,  to  be  paid  out  of  Uni- 
versity money,  and  would  be  in  the  difficult  position  of  sometimes 
having  results  of  investigations  published  which  it  might  not  ap- 
prove.   But  in  this  case  we  would  have  been  willing  to  waive  the 
pre-payment  of  the  expense.    We  would  have  been  willing  to  make 
an   agreement  to  permit  the  publication  of  the  results   by   the 
bureau  if  we  did  not  publish  them  within  a  certain  time,  or  to  per- 
mit their  publication  simultaneously  by  both  parties  after  they 
had  been  agreed  on.    But  these  terms  could  not  under  the  regu- 
lations of  the  department  be  accepted.    In  other  words,  the  prop- 
osition was  not  really  a  cooperative  one,  but  a  proposal  to  make 
an  employee  of  the  University  for  the  convenience  of  the  bureau. 
Another  illustration  may  be  taken  from  recent  experience. 
For  years  the  Commissioner  of  Education  has  been  accustomed 
to  collect  educational  statistics  from  the  collegiate  institutions  of 
the  country.    He  has  been  accustomed  to  send  his  blanks  to  the 
institutions.     About  a  year  ago  the  institutions  were  informed 
that  hereafter  their  statistics  would  be  collected  for  the  Commis- 
sioner through  the  State  Departments  of  Education.       A  notice 
was  sent  out  stating  that: 

"The  State  Department  of  Education  should  be  the  only 
agency  within  a  State  to  which  the  Federal  government  should 
be  required  to  apply  for  information  regarding  educational  statis- 
tics. Each  State  Department  of  Education  should  collect  and  in- 
clude in  its  reports  statistical  and  other  information  in  regard  to 
all  educational  institutions  and  activities,  public  and  private,  in 
the  State  ...  so  that  its  reports  may  constitute  a  history  of 
all  educational  activity  in  the  State." 


36  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

Now  this  seems  like  a  very  simple  change;  but  let  us  see 
what  is  involved.  The  very  words  that  the  Department  of  Edu- 
cation "should"  be  able  to  get  all  its  statistics  through  the  State 
Department  is  the  announcement  of  a  policy.  Why  should  it? 
If  it  should,  it  can  be  only  because  it  has  certain  official  relations 
with  these  State  Departments  of  Education.  What  law  estab- 
lished them?  By  what  authority  did  the  Commissioner  of  Edu- 
cation put  it  down  upon  the  various  State  Departments  to  return 
these  statistics?  By  what  authority  did  he  tell  the  colleges  and 
universities  that  reports  required  by  him  "should"  be  sent  to  the 
State  Departments?  It  will  not  be  many  years  before  the  phrase- 
ology will  vary  far  enough  to  be  an  order,  if  experience  in  similar 
lines  is  any  guide.  True,  the  word  "should,"  in  the  mind  of  the 
officer  who  first  issued  these  instructions,  may  have  meant  only 
to  indicate  what  he  thought  would  be  a  more  logical  arrangement. 
But  his  successor,  finding  the  instructions  in  practice,  would  be 
likely  to  interpret  them  as  obligatory. 

Vocational  education  has  recently  been  imposed  on  us.  Un- 
der proper  conditions,  suitable  vocational  education  ought  to  be 
provided.  But  under  the  law  our  communities  are  induced  to 
establish  it  by  an  offer  of  money,  provision  for  matching  which 
may  either  strain  their  resources  or  divert  to  this  kind  of  training 
local  money  which  should  go  to  improve  general  education.  More- 
over, the  States  were  required  to  establish  special  agencies  to 
deal  with  the  matter. 

"Machines  have  been  perfected  to  the  degree  that  in  three 
days  a  child  just  out  of  the  public  schools  can  be  taught  to  oper- 
ate one  as  well  as  an  efficient  machinist  who  served  a  long  appren- 
ticeship at  less  than  a  living  wage."  What  children  in  industrial 
communities  need  is  more  general,  rather  than  vocational,  educa- 
tion— education  to  make  a  life  rather  than  to  make  a  living. 

A  few  years  ago  two  officers  from  one  of  the  Washington 
departments  presented  themselves  in  the  office  of  one  of  our 
directors.  They  were  sent  to  do  work  which  was  considered  co- 
operative. One  of  these  young  officers  had  been  dropped  from 
this  particular  college.  The  other  had  been  dismissed  from  a 
position  as  farm  manager  for  incompetence. 

In  a  recent  address  an  officer  of  a  Federal  department  which 
has  to  do  with  our  higher  educational  institutions  said  to  his  Uni- 
versity cooperators,  "There  are  some  things  for  which  Federal 
money  cannot  be  spent  because  it  is  specifically  forbidden  in  the 
law  or  because  the  Secretary  does  not  consider  expenditure  for 
those  purposes  wise  under  the  law." 

The  Federal  officer  in  charge  of  these  cooperative,  fifty-fifty, 
investigations  not  only  determines  that  the  Federal  money  as- 
signed is  properly  spent;  he  assumes  to  pass  on  the  expenditure 


INSTALLATION  OF  PRESIDENT  KINLEY  37 

of  the  State  funds  also.  In  the  address  just  referred  to  is  the 
plain  statement,  "We  must  also  account  for  the  offset  funds." 

Some  years  ago  experts  in  Washington  took  issue  with  a 
distinguished  member  of  the  staff  of  this  University  on  certain 

scientific  matters.    We  were  told  that  unless  Professor  

ceased  his  contentions,  funds  assigned  to  an  entirely  different  de- 
partment of  the  University  would  be  withdrawn.  Our  staff  mem- 
ber did  not  cease  his  contentions.  I  may  add  that  the  funds 
were  not  withdrawn. 

In  showing  the  extension  of  Federal  control  through  admin- 
istrative action,  I  do  not  at  all  criticise  the  officers  concerned.  Any 
one  of  us  would  do  the  same  thing  because  they  are  held  respon- 
sible for  seeing  that  the  expenditures  are  made  in  a  way  to  avoid 
the  criticism  of  other  officers  in  their  own  and  other  departments. 
That  things  have  gone  as  well  as  they  have  is  due  to  the  reason- 
able attitude  taken  on  the  whole  by  all  concerned.  But  this  rea- 
sonable attitude  has  been  due  mainly  to  the  fact  that  the  execu- 
tives in  Washington  and  the  officers  of  the  universities  have  been 
generally  of  the  same  educational  generation  and  therefore  class- 
mates, friends,  etc. 

It  is  but  fair  to  say  that  the  numerous  acts  of  Congress  pro- 
viding for  activities  in  agriculture  and  home  economics  culminat- 
ing in  the  custom  known  as  the  fifty-fifty  plan  cannot  be  con- 
sidered as  indicating  an  intentionally  aggressive  policy  on  the  part 
of  Congress  in  relation  to  the  States. 

These  bills  for  the  most  part  did  not  originate  in  Congress, 
certainly  not  the  scores  that  have  failed  to  pass.  The  plain  truth 
is  that  so  many  and  such  varied  propositions  looking  to  drafts 
from  the  Federal  treasury  have  been  urged  upon  Congress  that 
in  sheer  defense  and  in  order  to  test  the  question  of  widespread 
need  and  interest  on  the  part  of  the  public,  Congress  has  adopted 
the  plan  of  retort  courteous  by  stipulating  that  the  condition  of 
enjoying  the  Federal  funds  is  the  appropriation  of  equal  amounts 
on  the  part  of  the  State. 

It  is  a  fair  proposition  on  the  face  of  it,  but  its  effects  are 
wholly  evil,  and  this  for  three  reasons: 

1.  No  State  or  university  can  withstand  the  pressure  of  pub- 
lic opinion  in  the  face  of  the  possibility  of  adding  to  its  resources 
from  the  public  treasury,  even  though  in  providing  the  offset  fund, 
the  amount  will  be  charged  against  the  institution  and  reduce 
thereby  its  budget  for  other  purposes. 

2.  In  the  administration  of  federal  funds  supplemented  by 
this  offset,  the  auditing  agent  of  the  institution  passes  not  only 
upon  expenditures  of  Federal  money  but  upon  an  equal  amount 
of  State  appropriations.     Now  reason  suggests   and   experience 


3 8  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

shows  that  when  the  policy  of  the  institution  as  a  whole  and  the 
policy  of  the  Federal  Department  fail  to  agree,  it  is  the  former 
that  must  give  way.  The  Federal  administration  to  that  extent 
will  dominate  the  policy  of  the  state  educational  institution. 

3.  This  leads  logically  to  a  comparison  of  the  educational 
policies  likely  to  evolve  in  a  university  as  compared  with  those 
likely  to  develop  through  the  decisions  of  an  executive  depart- 
ment. On  the  one  hand,  in  the  case  of  the  university,  there  is 
adequate  and  effective  machinery  for  deliberately  considering  a 
new  policy  in  all  its  relations  and  it  may  be  assumed  that  when 
its  faculties,  its  president,  and  its  trustees  have  arrived  at  a  con- 
clusion, it  is  a  fairly  wise  one,  not  only  that,  but  policies  can  be 
readily  changed  if  found  unwise  or  with  changing  conditions. 

On  the  other  hand,  policies  evolved  through  administrative 
decisions  are  not  the  result  of  discussion;  they  are  based  first  of 
all  upon  bureaucratic  interpretation  of  the  intent  of  the  law;  next, 
upon  the  mass  of  office  decisions  that  have  been  made  in  the 
various  departments  of  the  Federal  government;  and  finally,  upon 
the  individual  slant  of  the  particular  person  who  happens  to  be 
detailed  to  review  the  records  at  any  given  date.  Such  policies 
are  patch  work  policies  and  never  can  represent,  excepting  indi- 
rectly and  incompletely,  the  results  of  wise  deliberation.  While 
personal  friendship  has  saved  us  so  far  from  serious  consequences, 
it  is  well  that  the  system  be  altered  while  friendship  still  exists. 

The  question  of  the  autonomy  of  a  scientific  organization,  or 
even  of  the  university  to  which  it  may  belong,  as  over  against  the 
possible  control  by  a  Federal  Department  is  something  more  than 
an  academic  issue.  Neither  is  it  of  recent  significance,  for  a  consid- 
erable number  of  years  ago,  the  Secretary  of  Agriculture  not  only 
presumed  to  criticise  severely  the  policies  of  certain  state  experi- 
ment stations  but  announced  the  belief  that  the  whole  system  of 
experiment  stations  should  be  under  the  control  of  the  Department 
of  Agriculture,  which  condition  he  predicted  would  not  be  many 
years  in  developing. 

"Nothing  is  said  in  the  Constitution  about  education.  The 
States  reserved  to  themselves  the  management  of  their  schools." 
These  words  are  quoted  from  a  textbook  on  advanced  civics  used 
in  many  of  our  schools.  We  are  teaching  this  doctrine  to  our 
children.  Under  this  doctrine,  what  may  the  Federal  government 
properly  do  in  educational  matters? 

It  is  clear  that  there  is  much  that  the  Federal  government 
can  do  in  the  way  of  promoting  education  in  the  States  under  the 
authority  of  the  States  and  through  the  activity  of  the  States  and 
the  local  communities  within  their  boundaries.     Do  the  measures 


INSTALLATION  OF  PRESIDENT  KINLEY  39 

now  before  Congress  meet  the  test  of  promoting  education  while 
still  preserving  State  and  local  control? 

The  most  important  bill  now  in  the  House  proposes  to  create 
an  executive  department  in  the  government,  to  be  called  the  De- 
partment of  Education.  I  can  myself  see  no  objection  to  such  a 
proposal,  provided  the  authority  of  the  Secretary  does  not  infringe 
upon  that  of  State  and  local  officers.  The  bill  provides  that  all 
power  and  authority  conferred  by  law  upon  the  head  of  any  ex- 
ecutive department,  or  other  officer  transferred  from  existing  de- 
partments to  the  proposed  Department  of  Education,  shall  be 
vested  in  the  Secretary.  It  follows  that  all  administrative  usurpa- 
tions just  referred  to  as  practiced  in  other  departments  which  deal 
with  education  and  research  will  be  transferred  to  the  Secretary 
of  Education.  The  bill  provides  that  the  Department  of  Educa- 
tion shall  conduct  studies  and  investigations  in  the  field  of  edu- 
cation and  report  thereon.  It  provides  that  research  shall  be  un- 
dertaken in  illiteracy  and  certain  other  subjects.  Just  what  is 
meant  by  research  is  not  specified.  It  is  open  to  the  Secretary  to 
determine.  Certain  specific  fields  are  indicated  in  which  research 
shall  be  carried  on  and,  in  addition,  it  may  be  carried  on  "in  such 
other  fields  as,  in  the  judgment  of  the  Secretary  of  Education,  may 
require  attention  and  study."  Important  fields  of  educational 
research  are  in  the  conduct  of  classes  by  teachers,  the  psychology 
of  the  classroom,  etc.  May  the  Secretary  of  Education  enter  the 
school  rooms  of  the  country  to  conduct  this  research  if,  in  his 
judgment,  it  requires  attention  and  study?  The  very  sources  of 
information  necessary  for  him  to  conduct  his  studies  are  either 
under  his  control  for  this  purpose  or  they  are  not.  If  they  are 
not,  where  does  he  get  his  authority  to  enter  the  schools  of  the 
sovereign  States?  Can  he  or  his  agents  come  into  the  University 
of  Illinois  and  require  its  officers  to  make  reports  or  conduct  in- 
vestigations for  him  or  assist  in  their  conduct  or  in  any  way  give 
him  their  assistance,  in  the  absence  of  a  State  law  requiring  them 
to  do  so?  Yet,  if  this  law  passes,  it  will  not  be  many  years  before 
he  or  someone  representing  him  will  be  undertaking  to  do  this 
very  thing;  and  if  the  University  of  Illinois  refuses,  he  will  then 
use  the  pressure  of  professional,  public,  and  other  opinion,  unin- 
formed on  the  merits  of  the  situation,  to  brow-beat  the  University 
into  compliance. 

The  bill  under  consideration  provides  appropriations  for  cer- 
tain lines  of  education  to  be  expended  by  its  proposed  Department 
of  Education.  The  things  the  bill  aims  to  do,  educationally,  are 
good.  But  in  order  to  get  any  of  the  money  appropriated  a  State 
must  "qualify".  The  provision  for  qualification  is  "that  no  money 
shall  be  apportioned  to  any  State     .     .     .    unless  a  sum  at  least 


40  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

equally  as  large  shall  be  provided  by  said  State,  or  by  local  au- 
thorities, or  by  both,  for  the  same  purpose."  In  other  words,  this 
is  the  same  fifty-fifty  proposition  held  out  to  induce  the  States  to 
do  the  particular  things  that  the  Federal  department  wants.  The 
vicious  feature  of  the  whole  thing  is  that  money  is  offered  to  do 
particular  things  which  may  not  coincide,  on  the  whole,  with  the 
existing  State  school  purposes,  practice,  and  organization.  Sup- 
pose the  Federal  Department  should  sometime  offer  the  State  of 
Illinois  #100,000  for  the  University  to  do  some  extension  work 
which  it  is  not  now  doing,  on  condition  that  an  equivalent  amount 
be  put  from  State  funds.  What  would  happen?  Pressure 
would  be  brought  to  bear  on  the  University  to  provide  the  offset 
from  its  income.  To  do  so  it  would  have  to  abandon  established 
work  or  projected  plans  of  its  own.  The  influence  of  the  plan 
will,  therefore,  be  to  lead  communities  or  States  to  neglect  the 
educational  things  which  their  particular  conditions  should  cause 
them  to  institute  and  carry  on,  for  the  sake  of  getting  some  of  this 
money.  If  successful  in  securing  applications  for  grants  under 
such  circumstances,  something  else  that  is  being  done  or  should 
be  done  would  be  neglected.  Moreover,  in  some  cases,  if  not 
many,  and  if  not  all,  the  people  of  the  communities  themselves 
would  provide  for  the  improvement  of  their  educational  facilities 
under  the  stimulus  of  aroused  public  opinion  if  the  Federal  gov- 
ernment did  not  take  from  them  so  much  in  taxes  for  its  partic- 
ular purposes  and  then  try  to  induce  them  to  raise  another  sum 
over  and  above  what  they  have  paid  in  taxes  to  the  Federal  gov- 
ernment and  what  they  are  already  spending  on  their  schools. 
The  proposition  in  time  will  strain  the  resources  of  some  com- 
munities or  will  divert  the  line  of  their  educational  effort  or  will 
lead  them  to  neglect  to  provide  as  much  as  they  otherwise  would 
if  they  had  been  left  on  their  own  resources. 

The  proposed  measure  appears  like  an  attempt  to  do  indi- 
rectly what  the  Constitution  will  not  allow  directly.  It  is  popular 
to  condemn  the  "corporation  lawyer"  because  he  is  supposed  to 
find  ways  to  evade  the  spirit  of  the  law  while  observing  its  form. 
But  we,  through  Congress,  have  been  doing  that  with  the  Consti- 
tution for  a  long  time.  Are  we  not  now  proposing  to  educate  our 
children  in  good  citizenship,  which  includes  obedience  to  the  Con- 
stitution and  the  law,  under  a  system  based  upon  an  evasion  of 
the  Constitution?     Is  that  sound  political  morality? 

A  Federal  Department  of  Education  should  deal  with  educa- 
tional questions  of  national,  international,  and  interstate  character. 
There  are  such  problems.  The  Department  may  well  serve  us 
all  through  its  representatives  abroad  by  giving  us  information 
about  education  in  other  countries.     It  could  collect  information 


INSTALLATION  OF  PRESIDENT  KINLEY  41 

on  all  phases  of  education  in  our  own  country,  as  the  Census 
Bureau  does  in  a  general  way.  It  could  properly  set  up  standards 
of  teaching  and  educational  equipment  as  models  which  undoubt- 
edly rivalry  among  the  different  States  would  impel  them  to  try 
to  attain.  It  could  give  advice  to  any  State  educational  officer  or 
to  any  educational  institution  in  any  State  when  requested  to  do 
so  through  the  proper  State  educational  officer.  It  could,  on  sim- 
ilar requests,  send  its  agents  to  confer  and  advise  concerning  im- 
provements, provided  Congress  will  furnish  it  money  enough  to 
employ  agents  of  standing  whom  the  educational  officers  elsewhere 
will  respect  as  authorities  in  the  field.  It  could  publish  as  a  re- 
sult of  the  study  of  its  educational  census  its  ratings  of  the  educa- 
tional systems  and  institutions  in  the  States,  to  bring  public  opin- 
ion to  bear  on  their  improvement  by  the  people  themselves. 

If  Federal  aid  is  to  be  given  the  States  for  education  or  re- 
search, it  should  be  on  the  principle  of  the  first  Federal  grants  for 
the  Land  Grant  Colleges  and  of  the  second  Morrill  Act.  That  is 
to  say,  appropriations  should  be  made  direct  to  the  States,  to  be 
distributed  by  their  legislatures,  and  to  these  should  be  left  the 
mode  of  distribution.  For  the  public  schools  that  mode  should 
ordinarily  be  the  public  school  distributive  funds  already  estab- 
lished in  the  different  States,  or  which  could  be  established.  There 
should  be  no  more  of  the  practice  of  the  wealthy  private  donor, 
of  giving  a  dollar  provided  it  is  matched  by  another. 

Federal  statutes  on  education  should  not  undertake  to  deter- 
mine for  the  States  the  subject  matter  of  school  curriculums  at 
any  rate  beyond  those  commonly  accepted  curriculums  which  are 
regarded  as  the  warp  and  woof  of  a  general  education  for  citizen- 
ship in  a  democratic  Republic  like  our  own.  Assignments  of  money 
for  special  kinds  of  education  should  be  made  by  the  State  author- 
ities. If  there  is  a  class  of  people  widely  distributed  among  the 
States  who  need  education  of  a  special  kind,  it  would  be  proper  to 
ear-mark  a  certain  proportion  of  the  appropriation  to  the  State  for 
that  purpose.  Such  a  purpose  would  be  education  for  Americani- 
zation of  adult  immigrants.  Federal  concern,  especially  so  far  as 
it  involves  appropriations,  should  be  primarily  with  the  public 
school  system  as  ordinarily  understood. 

The  States  should  report,  of  course,  through  their  proper 
officers,  as  to  their  use  of  the  appropriations  made  to  them,  and 
the  Federal  Department  should,  in  turn,  report  to  Congress,  mak- 
ing such  comments  and  giving  such  advice  as  may  be  used  as  a 
basis  of  continuance  of  the  appropriations.  Further  appropria- 
tions should  be  a  reward  of  achievement  and  not  merely  a  mon- 
etary measure  of  need. 


42  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

Appropriations  to  higher  institutions  of  learning  in  the  various 
States  should  be  principally,  at  least,  for  research  looking  towards 
the  development  of  the  State,  its  people,  its  resources.  The  ap- 
propriation, again,  should  be  made  direct  to  the  States  without 
any  provision  of  a  fifty-fifty  character.  The  application  of  the 
fifty-fifty  principle  in  research,  as  in  teaching,  distorts  expenditure, 
breeds  jealousy  among  the  members  of  the  staff  of  an  institution, 
and  causes  resentment  when  particular  institutions  are  not  chosen 
to  assist  in  investigations  of  national  scope. 

The  best  antidote  against  the  tendency  towards  this  Federal 
development  in  education  is  a  vigorous  State  policy.  We  have  not 
done  our  duty  in  this,  as  well  as  in  some  other  matters.  What  is 
needed  more  than  Federal  appropriations  is  a  public  opinion 
aroused  to  the  neglect  of  education  and  the  dangers  of  that  neg- 
lect. Under  present  conditions  in  this  country,  the  Bureau  of 
Education,  or  Department  of  Education,  could  do  no  greater 
service  than  to  put  before  the  public  the  facts  concerning  our  ed- 
ucational delinquencies  in  the  various  States,  point  out  their  causes, 
and  indicate  where  the  responsibility  lies. 

I  have  mentioned  possible  relations  between  a  Federal  De- 
partment of  Education  and  the  higher  institutions  of  learning  in 
the  various  States.  The  University  of  Illinois,  a  State  University 
including  a  Land  Grant  College,  is  one  of  the  best  examples  of 
the  success  of  the  original  Federal  policy  of  an  assignment  of  funds 
or  their  equivalent  direct  to  the  State,  to  be  appropriated  and  man- 
aged by  the  State  Legislature.  Like  other  similarly  founded  in- 
stitutions, we  have  had  no  difficulties  with  the  Federal  Depart- 
ment of  Agriculture  under  the  original  Land  Grant  Act  or  the 
earlier  Agricultural  Acts,  but  we  have  had  under  later  laws,  such 
as  the  Smith-Lever  and  the  Smith-Hughes.  The  University  of 
Illinois,  I  may  say,  without  being  invidious,  is  one  of  the  greatest 
of  the  state  universities.  It  is  great  because  the  people  of  the 
State  have  made  it  so  and  not  because  of  Federal  appropriations. 
Yet  it  is  true  that  the  Federal  appropriations,  in  the  first  place 
and  later,  have  given  inspiration  to  the  people  of  the  State  to  make 
their  College  of  Agriculture  and  other  departments  of  the  Uni- 
versity worthy  of  themselves  and  their  great  State. 

The  University  is  only  a  little  over  fifty  years  old.  It  has  had 
five  great  Presidents — Gregory,  Peabody,  Burrill,  Draper,  and 
James.  It  has  always  had  great  men  on  its  faculty,  and  I  may 
say  that  I  am  proud  today  because  of  my  belief,  well  founded, 
that  the  faculty  of  this  institution,  which  is  the  principal  part  of 
its  working  organization,  not  only  compares  well  as  a  whole  with 
any  other,  but  includes  in  its  number  many  men  who  have  served 
their  country  and  the  world  well  by  great  contributions  to  knowl- 


INSTALLATION  OF  PRESIDENT  KINLEY  43 

edge.  Its  student  body  has  always  maintained  high  standards  of 
conduct.  The  public,  of  course,  hears  the  little  things,  incidents 
of  the  life  of  the  university  and  college  students.  It  does  not 
know,  as  we  who  live  with  them  day  by  day  know,  the  real  ear- 
nestness, the  high  moral  purposes,  and  the  ambitions  that  domi- 
nate the  conduct  of  the  great  mass  of  our  students. 

What  the  University  of  Illinois  means  to  the  State  of  Illinois 
cannot  be  expressed  in  monetary  values.  Aside  from  the  great 
intellectual  and  moral  current  which  has  passed  through  its  halls 
into  the  life  of  this  great  State  in  the  young  men  and  women  who 
have  been  graduated  from  it,  and  which  is  perhaps,  after  all,  its 
greatest  contribution  to  the  State  and  Nation,  it  has  repaid  in  an 
economic  sense  to  the  people  of  Illinois  many  times  what  it  has 
received  in  money  both  from  the  State  and  Federal  governments. 
Its  contributions  towards  the  improvement  of  the  social  and  polit- 
ical life  of  the  people,  as  well  as  towards  the  increase  of  their 
economic  welfare,  stand  out  in  the  history  of  science  and  educa- 
tion in  this  country. 

Today  the  University  of  Illinois,  like  similar  institutions,  is 
passing  through  a  period  of  stress  and  strain.  The  worst  of  it, 
to  be  sure,  in  a  sense  is  over.  Our  attendance  has  increased  in 
the  past  three  or  four  years  by  leaps  and  bounds,  crowding  our 
buildings,  burdening  the  teaching  staff,  and  raising  important 
questions  of  administration  and  education.  Among  those  ques- 
tions is  one  that  is  now  being  widely  discussed,  whether  attend- 
ance at  an  institution  like  this  should  not  be  limited.  Some  pro- 
pose that  the  students  shall  be  "distributed"  among  other  institu- 
tions, especially  the  students  of  the  first  two  years.  Others  pro- 
pose a  general  limitation  without  reference  to  the  assignment  of 
students  to  other  institutions,  on  the  ground  that  so  many  cannot 
be  handled  well  in  one  institution,  and  that  the  number  should 
be  reduced  by  raising  standards.  Complaint  is  made  that  num- 
bers have  become  an  ambition  and  that  the  number  of  those 
seeking  a  higher  education  is  far  in  excess  of  the  number  which 
should  be  so  educated.  I  do  not  myself  sympathize  with  these 
views  or  join  in  these  complaints.  No  man  has  any  right  under 
a  government  like  ours  to  undertake  to  determine  that  only  a  few 
shall  be  permitted  to  get  an  education  of  higher  grade.  In  a 
democracy  the  only  proper  course  is  to  keep  proper  standards  and 
welcome  all  who  can  meet  them.  In  saying  this,  I  am  speaking, 
of  course,  of  a  publicly  supported  institution.  Certainly,  the 
people  who  are  sending  their  children  to  be  educated  will  furnish 
the  means  to  provide  the  education.  I  have  no  fear  about  ad- 
ministrative difficulties  any  more  than  I  have  about  teaching 
difficulties,  on  account  of  the  increasing  attendance  at  the  Uni- 


44  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

versity  of  Illinois,  provided  always  the  people  supply  adequate 
means  to  do  the  work.  A  large  number  means  simply  a  more 
subdivided  and  complex  organization.  If  we  have  adequate  means 
to  divide  the  large  number  into  a  sufficient  number  of  units,  each 
small  enough  for  proper  teaching  and  with  proper  accommoda- 
tions, I  do  not  see  why  we  cannot  handle  a  thousand  such  units 
as  successfully  as  a  hundred.  Therefore,  so  far  as  I  have  any- 
thing to  say  about  the  future  policy  of  the  University  of  Illinois, 
it  will  be  along  the  line  of  maintaining  its  standards  and  welcom- 
ing to  its  doors  all  those  who  can  meet  those  standards,  up  to  the 
limit  of  the  means  which  their  fathers  and  mothers  are  willing  to 
supply  through  their  legislature. 

In  its  teaching  relations  the  University  of  Illinois,  although 
a  state  university,  has  no  direct  authoritative  connection  with  the 
Federal  Bureau  of  Education.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  no  Federal 
Department  of  Education  will  ever  have  authority  to  say  to  this 
University  what  it  shall  teach  or  how  it  shall  teach  it  or  shall  be 
in  a  position  to  distort  its  budget  by  offering  money  for  things 
determined  by  the  Federal  Department,  to  be  done  in  the  way 
provided  by  the  Federal  Department.  Yet  the  University  of 
Illinois  will  always  look  to  a  Federal  Department  of  Education 
for  inspiration  and  help  and  will  be  glad  to  cooperate  in  all  edu- 
cational matters  with  such  a  Department.  It  will  not  seek  to  give 
this  cooperation  in  ways  dictated  by  itself  any  more  than  it  would 
be  willing  to  give  it  in  ways  dictated  by  the  Department.  It  will 
gladly  follow  the  wishes  of  the  Department  in  matters  of  common 
interest  insofar  as  it  can  do  so  without  impairing  its  own  individ- 
uality as  an  educational  institution  or  surrendering  the  dignity 
and  authority  which  the  people  of  the  State  have  conferred  upon  it. 

The  University  of  Illinois  has  also  made  and  is  making  con- 
tributions to  research  like  its  sister  institutions  in  other  States. 
Research  is  more  expensive,  in  a  certain  sense,  than  teaching.  Yet 
I  take  it  that  the  state  universities  and  all  universities  are  bound 
in  the  future  to  do  more  rather  than  less  research;  to  search  for 
the  discovery  of  truth  in  more  lines  of  inquiry  than  they  have  in 
the  past.  In  this  field  there  is  a  great  opportunity  for  coopera- 
tion with  a  Federal  Department  of  Education,  as  well  as  with 
other  Federal  departments,  in  the  investigation  of  problems  that 
are  of  more  than  State-wide  scope.  Yet  the  University's  research 
departments,  insofar  as  these  are  organized  for  specific  purposes, 
like  the  Agricultural  Experiment  Station  and  the  Engineering  Ex- 
periment Station,  must  always  feel  bound  to  investigate,  first, 
problems  that  have  a  bearing  upon  the  life  of  the  people  of  our 
own  State,  while  not  neglecting  to  make  their  contributions  to 
other  problems.     Our  research,  so  far  as  it  is  unorganized,  and 


INSTALLATION  OF  PRESIDENT  KINLEY  45 

that,  in  a  way,  is  the  largest  part,  consisting  of  the  search  after 
truth  by  individual  members  of  the  University,  will  depend  in  the 
future,  as  always,  here  and  elsewhere,  for  its  interest  and  charac- 
ter upon  the  men  who  engage  in  it.  Each  must  be  left  free  and 
untrammeled  to  seek  the  light  in  his  own  way.  So  best  can  he 
contribute  to  the  public  advancement. 

In  its  relation  to  the  State,  the  policy  of  the  University  is  to 
train  young  men  and  women  who  will  find  their  success  in  the 
service  of  the  people.  It  is  to  discover  new  truths  which  will  im- 
prove the  culture  of  the  people,  using  that  word  in  its  largest  sense. 
The  results  of  its  efforts  will  not  be  confined  within  State  lines;  in- 
deed, they  could  not  be.  The  discovery  of  new  lines  of  progress, 
the  training  of  men  and  women  who  lead  their  fellow  citizens  into 
them,  are  the  ambition,  the  aim,  and  the  ideal  of  this  University. 
It  is  the  developmental  arm  of  the  State,  whose  business  is  to 
train  leaders  of  the  people  for  future  progress  and  to  blaze  new 
paths  of  progress  for  the  people  to  follow  in  the  years  to  come. 

To  perform  this  service  it  must  remain  as  free  as  it  always 
has  been.  It  is  one  of  the  glories  of  the  State  of  Illinois  that  it 
has  made  its  University  free.  Its  Trustees  are  the  direct  repre- 
sentatives of  the  people  and  are  free  to  go  back  to  the  pople  at 
any  time  for  instructions  and  support.  The  representatives  of  the 
people  in  the  legislature  loyally  support  their  institution.  One  of 
the  wonders  of  our  history  is  that  the  State  Legislature  has  always 
been  so  generous  and  so  ready.  We  are  held  to  strict  accounta- 
bility, of  course,  and  we  are  glad  to  be  so  held.  But  in  the  dis- 
charge of  the  duties  entrusted  to  us  no  institution  could  be  freer 
from  political  control.  We  desire  to  maintain  this  relation,  both 
with  reference  to  the  State  government  and  to  the  Federal  gov- 
ernment. We  would  welcome  further  Federal  support  of  public 
education  and  would  welcome  closer  relations  between  a  Federal 
Department  and  the  University  itself.  But  that  Federal  relation- 
ship should  leave  as  much  freedom  and  give  as  much  generous 
moral  support  to  the  University  as  the  legislature  of  the  State 
itself  does  and  always  has  done.  Any  Federal  intervention  in 
education  which  does  not  do  this  for  the  higher  institutions  of 
learning  and  for  the  public  schools,  will  not,  in  the  long  run,  pro- 
mote education  of  the  kind  that  we  need  in  a  country  like  ours. 
It  may  develop  a  mechanical,  uniform  system  of  education 
throughout  the  States,  dictated  from  a  central  source.  But  it  can 
never  give  that  freedom  of  teaching  and  research  necessary  to  the 
highest  success.  It  can  never  furnish  that  variety  of  curricula 
and  methods  of  administration  required  by  the  varying  conditions 
of  life  in  the  different  States,  the  continuance  of  which  is 
necessary  if  we  are  to  have  that  variety  in  unity  and  unity  in 


46  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

variety  which  in  all  departments  of  American  life  is  the  very 
essence  of  Americanism. 

The  most  important  question  of  internal  administration  be- 
fore the  American  people  today  is  whether  or  not  this  onward 
sweep  of  Federal  control  over  the  details  of  their  local  affairs 
shall  go  on.  The  part  of  that  question  which  we  are  considering 
today  is  whether  it  is  advisable  to  permit  it  to  include  our  educa- 
tion. Shall  we  accept  the  doctrine  that  we  are  destined  to  become 
a  great  continental  democracy,  governed  in  all  important  public 
activities  from  Washington,  or  shall  we  try  to  preserve  the  local 
autonomy  in  communities  and  States  which  is  necessary  to  the 
preservation  of  our  liberties?  If  we  accept  the  doctrine  that  it  is 
well  to  become  a  continental  democracy,  there  is  no  need  of  further 
discussion,  and  State  governments  may  as  well  be  abandoned.  If 
we  do  not  accept  that  doctrine,  but  stand  up  against  the  present 
tendency,  we  should  keep  our  State  governments  in  substance 
and  not  merely  in  form.  Above  all,  we  should  keep  our  education 
out  of  Federal  bureaucratic  control. 


GREETINGS  FROM  OTHER  INSTITUTIONS 

At  the  close  of  President  Kinley's  address,  greetings  from  the 
representatives  of  the  State  and  of  other  institutions  and  organi- 
zations were  presented  as  follows: 

The  Governor  of  Illinois,  the  Honorable  Len  Small,  represented 
by  Mr.  George  Barr,  Director  of  Trade  and  Commerce. 

The  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction,  the  Honorable 
Francis  G.  Blair  (greetings  read  by  Chairman). 

The  Normal  Schools  and  State  Teachers'  Colleges,  represented  by 
Doctor  Livingston  C.  Lord,  President  of  the  Eastern  Illinois 
State  Teachers'  College. 

The  Colleges  and  Universities  in  the  State  of  Illinois,  represented 
by  Doctor  C.  H.  Rammelkamp,  President  of  Illinois  College. 

The  Illinois  Agricultural  Association,  represented  by  Mr.  Harvey 
J.  Sconce,  First  President  of  the  Association  and  Special  Del- 
egate to  the  International  Institute  of  Agriculture  at  Rome. 

The  Illinois  Chamber  of  Commerce,  represented  by  President 
John  H.  Camlin. 

Doctor  Edmund  Janes  James,  President  Emeritus  (greetings  read 
by  Chairman). 

The  State  Universities,  represented  by  Doctor  Edward  A.  Birge, 
President  of  the  University  of  Wisconsin. 


PROBLEMS  OF  ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  APPROPRI- 
ATIONS TO  STATE  INSTITUTIONS 

By  E.  W.  Allen,  Chief,  Office  of  Experiment  Stations, 
U.  S.  Department  of  Agriculture 

HEN  President  Buchanan  in  1859  vetoed  the  Mor- 
rill Land  Grant  Bill,  upon  which  the  whole  super- 
structure of  public  education  in  agriculture  and 
the  mechanic  arts  rests,  he  assigned  as  one  of  his 
reasons  doubt  that  the  purpose  it  sought  to  ac- 
complish would  be  assured.  He  said:  "It  is  ex- 
tremely doubtful,  to  say  the  least,  whether  this  bill  would  con- 
tribute to  the  advancement  of  agriculture  and  the  mechanic  arts," 
since  "the  Federal  Government  which  makes  the  donation  has 
confessedly  no  constitutional  power  to  follow  it  into  the  States 
and  enforce  the  application  of  the  fund  to  the  intended  objects. 
As  donors  we  shall  possess  no  control  over  our  own  gift  after  it 
shall  have  passed  from  our  hands,"  for,  he  added,  "The  Federal 
Government  has  no  power,  and  ought  to  have  no  power,  to  com- 
pel the  execution  of  the  trust." 

This  not  only  reflected  an  extreme  view  of  the  sovereignty 
of  the  States,  current  to  some  extent  at  that  time,  but  it  suggested 
a  lack  of  confidence  either  in  the  integrity  or  the  judgment  of  the 
States  in  carrying  out  the  provisions  of  the  measure,  he  plainly 
did  not  favor.  It  must  be  admitted  that  subsequent  events  sup- 
plied some  measure  of  justification  for  his  apprehension. 

When  the  Morrill  Act  passed  three  years  later,  it  carried  "no 
power  to  compel  the  execution  of  the  trust,"  but  only  an  enun- 
ciation of  the  purpose  of  the  measure  and  provision  for  the  con- 
trol of  the  allotment  of  land  it  granted.  Little  supervision  was 
exercised  under  it  and  but  slight  attempt  at  interpretation  of  the 
educational  features  it  contemplated.  There  was  small  suggestion 
or  guidance  from  a  central  agency,  and  the  States  proceeded  alone 
and  quite  independently. 

As  is  common  knowledge,  considerable  disappointment  arose 
over  the  development  of  agricultural  instruction  and  the  use  made 
of  the  land  grant  funds  in  some  of  the  States.  In  fully  a  half 
dozen  cases  it  found  expression  in  the  separation  of  the  colleges 
of  agriculture  and  mechanic  arts  from  the  institutions  with  which 
they  had  originally  been  connected,  and  it  was  responsible  in 
several  of  the  newer  States  for  the  establishment  of  these  col- 
leges as  separate  institutions.     Persistent  efforts  were  made  by 

47 


48  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

the  people  to  realize  in  larger  measure  their  expectations  of  these 
colleges,  but  with  only  partial  success.  We  know  now  that  the 
trouble  lay  in  part  with  the  undeveloped  basis  for  agricultural 
teaching. 

The  coming  of  experiment  stations  in  a  few  of  the  States  led 
to  renewed  hope,  and  the  Hatch  Act  providing  for  a  national 
system  of  stations  was  passed  in  1887,  twenty-five  years  after  the 
Morrill  Act.  It  was  specific  as  to  purpose,  and  it  called  upon 
the  Federal  Department  of  Agriculture  to  promote  its  purposes, 
clothing  it  with  advisory  powers.  But  again  it  left  the  matter  of 
carrying  out  its  provisions  entirely  to  the  States. 

In  1890  came  the  second  Morrill  Act,  which  for  the  first  time 
contained  provision  for  Governmental  administration.  It  ex- 
pressed a  Congressional  desire  for  a  closer  restriction  and  super- 
vision of  the  funds  arising  under  it,  and  accordingly  gave  the 
Secretary  of  the  Interior  jurisdiction  and  charged  him  with  the 
proper  administration  of  the  law,  payment  of  the  semi-annual 
allotments  to  be  on  his  warrant.  In  1894  similar  authority  was 
conferred  on  the  Secretary  of  Agriculture  with  respect  to  the  ex- 
periment station  fund,  because  the  desirability  of  some  super- 
visory measure  had  been  suggested  by  the  seven  years'  experi- 
ence. 

The  spirit  of  the  Hatch  Act  was  slow  in  finding  acceptance  in 
quite  a  few  of  the  States.  Its  avowed  purpose  was  to  aid  the 
States,  but  this  was  interpreted  by  some  of  them  to  mean  relief 
from  obligations  they  had  been  carrying.  Several  of  those  which 
were  already  maintaining  stations  immediately  discontinued  their 
State  appropriations  and  fell  back  on  the  Government  fund.  Oth- 
ers planned  to  transfer  to  it  the  expense  of  their  police  activities, 
such  as  the  inspection  of  fertilizers,  etc.,  but  the  Treasury  Depart- 
ment declared  this  illegal.  At  the  colleges  the  Federal  fund  was 
applied  to  the  salaries  of  such  general  officers  as  the  president,  the 
secretary  and  the  librarian,  and  teachers  with  heavy  duties  were 
often  given  station  assignments.  The  operation  and  maintenance 
of  the  entire  college  farm  in  numerous  instances  was  transferred 
to  the  station,  including  the  educational  equipment,  live  stock, 
commercial  features,  general  service,  etc.  In  a  number  of  cases 
this  stock  and  equipment  was  sold  to  the  station  piece-meal  and 
paid  for  from  Federal  funds;  and  in  others  attempt  was  made  to 
collect  rent  from  the  station  for  the  use  of  the  college  farm.  It 
was  not  uncommon  for  the  proceeds  of  these  farming  operations 
to  be  claimed  by  the  college  for  general  purposes.  In  a  consider- 
able number  of  States  the  funds  were  divided  and  distributed 
over  the  State  in  permanent  substations  and  local  "model  farms." 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  49 

Of  course  you  will  understand  that  these  things  are  to  be 
viewed  purely  in  the  light  of  the  times  and  in  their  cause-and- 
effect  relations.  They  are  cited  to  illustrate  the  interpretation 
which  was  made  of  this  measure — not  by  all  the  institutions  by 
any  means,  and  to  show  that  the  colleges  and  the  States  them- 
selves had  been  only  partially  able  to  secure  compliance  with  the 
spirit  of  the  organic  act.  They  interposed  no  objection  when 
Federal  supervision  was  proposed.  There  was  some  evidence  of 
apprehension,  either  voiced  or  to  be  felt;  and  this  came  to  light 
again  when  plans  and  definitions  were  being  put  into  effect  under 
the  supplementary  Act  of  1906.  But  as  one  who  had  part  in  the 
supervisory  measures  inaugurated,  I  wish  to  say  that  the  general 
spirit  in  which  they  were  received  was  most  gratifying,  and  the 
cordial  relations  which  developed  from  the  first  have  made  pos- 
sible such  benefits  as  have  accrued. 

Later  legislation  continued  the  provision  for  administrative 
supervision,  and  extended  the  functions  of  the  Federal  depart- 
ments in  relation  to  these  measures.  Thus  the  Smith-Lever  Act 
for  cooperative  extension  work  in  agriculture  and  home  economics, 
defines  the  scope  and  limitations  of  the  enterprise  in  considerable 
detail,  stipulates  that  plans  for  the  work  are  to  be  submitted  by 
the  colleges  annually  and  approved  by  the  Secretary  of  Agricul- 
ture, and  empowers  the  latter  to  supervise  and  control  the  opera- 
tions of  the  Act.  The  Vocational  Education  Act  likewise  goes 
into  much  detail  regarding  the  nature  of  the  varied  enterprise, 
and  vests  the  Federal  Board  of  Vocational  Education  with  large 
supervisory  and  administrative  powers. 

It  will  be  realized  that  there  has  been  much  progress  in  re- 
cent years  in  the  relations  of  the  Federal  Government  with  the 
States.  This  is  seen  in  provisions  for  the  enforcement  of  laws, 
quarantine  regulations,  combating  agricultural  pests,  road  build- 
ing, and  in  many  other  ways.  Apparently  this  expansion  has  led 
the  general  Government  to  feel  that  its  contracts  with  the  States 
involving  the  expenditure  of  funds  should  be  more  carefully 
drawn,  and  some  authority  given  Federal  agents  to  see  that  they 
are  complied  with.  This  supplies  a  broad  fundamental  reason  for 
the  supervisory  legislation. 

By  acceptance  of  these  various  congressional  acts  for  educa- 
tion and  assent  to  their  provisions,  the  State  legislatures  entered 
into  contracts  with  the  Federal  Government,  turning  over  the  ex- 
ecution to  designated  institutions.  Hence  the  same  obligation 
rests  on  the  institution  as  on  the  State. 

Financial  control  in  the  strict  sense  has  constituted  a  rela- 
tively small  part  of  the  activities  under  Government  administra- 
tion, and  after  the  general  principle  and  purpose  has  been  ac- 


5o  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

cepted  small  reliance  has  been  placed  on  literalism  in  interpre- 
tation of  the  laws.  Negative,  repressive  action  accomplishes  little 
which  is  permanent  or  constructive.  The  measures  have  been  re- 
garded rather  from  the  standpoint  of  the  opportunity  they  afford. 
The  desire  has  been  to  make  the  most  of  this  opportunity,  and  to 
assist  the  States  in  accomplishing  this  through  means  especially 
appropriate  to  a  central  agency.  Out  of  the  combined  experiences 
of  different  localities  naturally  come  lessons  which  are  important 
in  securing  effective  operation  or  avoiding  mistakes,  especially  in 
case  of  a  new  enterprise.  Because  the  Federal  agencies  maintain 
these  close  contacts  the  country  over,  they  are  in  position  to  draw 
these  deductions  and  present  them  to  others;  and  because  they  are 
closer  to  Congress  than  the  more  remote  State  institutions,  the} 
feel  the  pressure  of  Congressional  opinion  more  keenly,  especially 
with  respect  to  recent  measures. 

It  is  important,  therefore,  to  recognize  that  the  Government's 
interest  in  these  matters  has  gone  beyond  that  of  a  donor  of  funds. 
The  Federal  grants  are  not  regarded  in  the  nature  of  gifts  or  en- 
dowments in  the  ordinary  sense  of  private  benefactions.  There  is 
little  evidence,  certainly  of  late,  that  Congress  has  thought  of  the 
appropriations  it  made  in  the  light  of  subsidies. 

Having  established  these  features  in  the  State  colleges,  it  has 
become  a  partner  in  them,  not  alone  in  their  support  but  to  a 
certain  extent  in  the  working  out  of  the  fundamental  idea.  More 
and  more  Congress  has  come  to  view  these  institutions  as  in  part- 
nership with  the  Government.  Furthermore,  it  has  attempted  to 
develop  a  national  system,  and  hence  has  had  certain  general  pol- 
icies it  desired  to  see  carried  out.  Later  legislation  especially  has 
committed  it  to  the  policy  of  promoting  the  general  good  of  these 
various  branches  of  effort.  The  primary  object,  then,  has  been 
to  aid  the  States  in  developing  this  novel  educational  system  on 
a  national  basis. 

It  will  assist  in  a  clear  understanding  if  this  cooperative 
feature  is  borne  in  mind,  for  it  is  basic  in  expressing  relations 
and  defining  the  part  the  Government  may  properly  take  in  ad- 
ministration. One  of  the  problems  has  been  to  secure  the  accep- 
tance of  the  cooperative  idea,  the  dual  interest,  the  fact  that  the 
Government  and  the  States  are  partners  in  this  great  undertaking. 
In  many  cases  the  States  have  not  recognized  it  or  the  trend  in 
Congress,  and  this  is  responsible  for  their  failure  to  attach  im- 
ative  in  the  aim  to  assist  such  States  as  might  elect  to  carry  out  its 
portance  to  certain  matters  of  detail  and  frequently  to  overlook 
the  community  of  interest  involved. 

While  the  terms  of  cooperation  were  not  definitely  stipulated 
in  the  earlier  acts,  the  original  land  grant  was  inherently  cooper- 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  51 

purpose.  The  experiment  station  act  likewise  was  to  aid  the 
States,  and  led  to  a  central  agency  in  the  Department  of  Agricul- 
ture to  render  various  forms  of  assistance.  From  time  to  time 
Congress  has  "authorized  and  directed"  the  experiment  stations  to 
cooperate  with  the  Department  of  Agriculture  in  various  enter- 
prises, such  as  soil  surveys,  conducting  investigations  in  human 
nutrition,  irrigation,  drainage,  forage,  crops,  etc. 

The  Extension  Act  marked  a  decided  advance  in  the  coopera- 
tive idea.  It  assumed  that  the  Federal  Department  of  Agriculture 
as  well  as  the  States  had  acquired  much  information  which  it 
was  desirable  to  present  to  the  farming  people  of  the  country  by 
this  intimate  method,  and  so  it  joined  the  Department  and  the 
States,  and  gave  funds  that  each  might  have  a  part  in  the  cooper- 
ative undertaking,  through  a  system  centered  in  the  colleges.  The 
Vocational  Education  Act,  passed  as  recently  as  19 17,  has  cooper- 
ation written  all  through  it. 

The  growing  extent  and  success  of  cooperation  between  the 
Federal  Government  and  the  States,  and  the  fact  that  coopera- 
tion in  a  great  variety  of  matters  is  more  largely  in  the  program 
than  ever  before,  is  doubtless  a  large  factor  in  the  progressive  pro- 
vision for  it  in  these  measures.  It  assumes  that  in  theory  at  least 
there  is  no  reason  why  the  cooperative  spirit  may  not  properly 
prevail  in  relation  to  education  without  sacrifice  of  individuality 
or  affecting  educational  policy  beyond  the  influence  which  was 
exerted  by  the  acceptance  of  the  Morrill  and  succeeding  acts. 
Manifestly  the  course  of  development  of  the  land  grant  colleges 
has  been  profoundly  influenced  by  the  successive  measures.  The 
Federal  Government  supplied  the  initiative  in  the  form  of  the 
motive  and  the  financial  nest  egg;  and  at  certain  stages  in  the 
history  of  all  these  colleges  this  impulse  and  support  have  meant 
much  to  their  success.  Altho  at  many  of  the  larger  institu- 
tions the  Federal  contributions  have  come  to  constitute  a  rela- 
tively small  proportion  of  the  total  budget,  the  extent  of  the  part 
the  Government  has  played  and  its  influence  in  making  these  in- 
stitutions what  they  are  cannot  properly  be  measured  on  that  basis. 

Acceptance  of  this  view  of  the  partnership  relation  between 
the  two  agencies  naturally  implies  an  obligation  on  the  part  of 
the  colleges  to  take  a  national  point  of  view,  rather  than  one  re- 
stricted wholly  to  their  respective  States.  This  in  turn  involves 
study  of  the  Federal  legislation  and  the  trend  of  the  attitude  of 
Congress  in  that  light.  Good  administration  is  favored  by  a  clear 
understanding  of  what  is  implied  in  the  contracts,  and  by  location 
of  authority  within  the  institution  to  insure  attention  to  these 
various  features  and  to  the  maintenance  of  the  Federal  contracts. 


52  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

Apparently  there  has  not  been  wholly  unanimous  acceptance 
of  the  cooperative  spirit  of  these  acts  or  of  what  cooperation  im- 
plies. The  views  of  Federal  officers  on  this  point  have  sometimes 
been  declared  to  be  extreme,  and  on  the  other  hand,  those  of 
college  officers  have  sometimes  appeared  so.  It  is  occasionally 
urged  by  the  latter  that  the  Federal  appropriations  should  be 
turned  over  to  the  States  to  use  in  accordance  with  their  judg- 
ment, with  quite  limited  supervision  of  plans  and  expenditures 
and  with  but  little  emphasis  on  cooperation.  But  manifestly  the 
Federal  acts  and  the  terms  of  their  acceptance  are  opposed  to  such 
a  course. 

This  attitude  is  sometimes  further  illustrated  with  respect  to 
the  State  or  local  funds  raised  to  offset  the  Federal  appropriation. 
Complaint  is  made  that  these  funds  and  the  plans  for  their  use 
are  likewise  subject  to  Federal  supervision  as  far  as  they  offset 
Smith-Lever  funds,  apparently  losing  sight  of  the  50-50  stipula- 
tion of  the  act  and  the  provision  for  its  administration  by  the  Sec- 
retary of  Agriculture. 

The  psychology  of  this  attitude  is  not  easy  to  understand. 
As  long  as  the  law  remains  as  it  is,  a  considerable  measure  of 
supervision  is  manifestly  inevitable,  and  there  are  many  who  be- 
lieve it  should  not  be  relinquished.  When  a  State  offset  may  call 
for  as  much  as  #190,000  annually,  a  bare  statement  that  the  re- 
quired amount  had  been  raised  and  spent  would  not  satisfy  any 
responsible  fiscal  agent,  and  should  not  be  expected  to.  The  pub- 
lic appropriating  such  large  sums  for  specific  purposes  is  quite 
within  the  proprieties  in  requiring  an  accounting  which  will  safe- 
guard its  interests.  Bookkeeping  sometimes  gives  quite  fictitious 
results.  It  sometimes  misleads  administrative  officers  themselves. 
A  case  is  recalled  two  or  three  years  ago  in  which  an  examination 
of  the  State  funds  of  an  experiment  station  by  local  officials,  to 
refute  a  public  charge  that  the  station  was  being  used  as  a  cats- 
paw  to  secure  money  for  the  college,  disclosed  that  about  #25,000, 
or  a  quarter  of  the  annual  station  appropriation,  was  being  di- 
verted to  instructional  purposes,  inadvertently,  no  doubt,  and  to 
meet  a  pressing  need.  In  19 19  the  States  reported  an  aggregate 
maintenance  fund  of  #7,192,912  for  the  experiment  stations,  which 
close  analysis  and  interpretation  shrunk  to  a  little  over  #4,250,000. 
There  was  no  intention  of  making  misleading  returns;  they  merely 
represented  the  accountant's  interpretations. 

These  things  suggest  the  propriety  of  a  type  of  supervision 
which  goes  beyond  the  books  and  vouchers  to  the  actual  work 
they  stand  for. 

Coming  now  more  specifically  to  the  problems  arising  in  Gov- 
ernmental administration,  it  may  be  said  that  these  have  turned 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  53 

quite  largely  on  the  standards  implied  in  the  various  types  of 
effort — in  teaching,  in  research  and  in  extension,  the  proper  scope 
of  activities,  and  the  restriction  of  funds  to  them.  Behind  such 
considerations  has  sometimes  been  a  narrow,  provincial  view  which 
placed  local  advantage  above  all  else,  a  lack  of  full  sympathy  with 
the  main  idea,  or  sometimes  a  personal  ambition  seeking  to  de- 
velop a  broader  institution  than  provided  for  by  the  State  support. 

Such  a  conflict  of  human  interests  and  ambitions  has  not 
been  uncommon  in  the  past.  It  was  evidenced  in  many  cases  in 
the  original  location  of  the  colleges  with  little  reference  to  the 
best  conditions  for  their  work,  geographically,  agriculturally,  or 
otherwise.  Politics  and  local  sentiment  located  most  of  the  agri- 
cultural colleges,  especially  in  the  newer  sections,  and  frequently 
did  a  very  bad  job  which  rises  up  periodically  to  haunt  the  insti- 
tutions and  cause  uncertainty  in  plans  for  their  permanent  growth. 
In  at  least  three  States  there  are  now  movements  on  foot  or  in  the 
air  to  separate  the  agricultural  college  or  to  relocate  other  parts  of 
the  institution.  It  affects  the  policy  and  effectiveness  of  those  in- 
stitutions, and  it  brings  administrative  questions.  In  several  in- 
stances only  a  strong  stand  on  the  part  of  Federal  authorities  has 
prevented  the  separation  or  the  moving  of  experiment  stations  to 
satisfy  local  ambition.  One  of  the  first  acts  under  Federal  super- 
vision was  to  discontinue  the  dissipation  of  the  Hatch  fund  among 
different  sections  of  the  States  in  the  maintenance  of  branch  sta- 
tions and  "model"  farms. 

For  years  this  disadvantage  of  location  has  been  apparent  in 
the  research  work  of  a  number  of  institutions,  and  it  has  been 
necessary  to  take  account  of  it  in  the  administration  of  funds.  In 
one  State  the  experiment  station  was  illegally  separated  from  the 
agricultural  college  prior  to  Federal  supervision,  and  became  a 
purely  local  institution,  subject  to  political  domination  of  the 
worst  type.  As  a  result,  the  State  was  in  large  measure  deprived 
of  the  advantages  which  should  have  accrued  from  an  experiment 
station,  and  it  failed  to  contribute  to  its  maintenance.  When  the 
situation  had  become  so  intolerable  as  to  warrant  the  Department 
in  an  attempt  to  secure  the  transfer  of  the  station  back  to  the 
college,  not  only  was  the  backing  of  the  State  wholly  lacking  but 
Congress  was  induced  to  legalize  the  separate  arrangement. 

Political  and  local  interest  have  not  stopped,  however,  with 
the  location  of  institutions.  Often  their  administrative  authori- 
ties have  been  under  pressure  they  could  not  successfully  resist, 
even  from  the  chief  executive  of  the  State.  It  is  unnecessary  to 
go  back  into  history  to  find  such  instances.  In  the  case  of  one 
State  college  whose  Federal  funds  comprise  a  large  measure  of  its 
support,  the  Governor  recently  made  two  complete  changes  in  the 


54  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

board  within  nine  months,  dismissing  the  old  members  and  ap- 
pointing new  ones,  so  that  the  institution  had  three  different 
boards  within  a  year.  That  college,  organized  about  1890,  now 
has  its  tenth  president. 

Within  the  year  another  State  has  furnished  an  exhibition 
of  the  upheaval  of  its  college  in  the  enforced  resignation  or  dis- 
missal of  its  principal  administrative  officers,  together  with  numer- 
ous heads  of  departments  and  lesser  employees.  That  college  has 
had  seven  presidents  in  the  last  thirty  years,  and  the  experiment 
station  has  had  to  bear  the  burden  of  eleven  changes  in  director- 
ship. How  can  continuity  of  policy  or  of  research  projects  be 
expected  under  such  adverse  conditions?  The  Federal  funds  have 
been  withheld  repeatedly,  but  without  a  supporting  local  senti- 
ment little  of  permanent  advantage  can  be  accomplished.  To 
cite  one  other  case,  a  State  university,  organized  in  1892,  now  has 
its  seventh  president  and  the  experiment  station  its  ninth  director. 
It  is  to  be  hoped  that  both  may  be  more  permanent  than  their 
predecessors.  The  directors  of  no  less  than  a  quarter  of  the  ex- 
periment stations  have  changed  during  the  past  twelve  months, 
not  all,  fortunately,  through  compulsory  action. 

It  will  be  readily  understood  that  such  administrative  "merry- 
go-rounds"  mean  real  problems  for  the  agency  which  is  seeking 
to  promote  steady  development  and  secure  increasingly  effective 
use  of  Federal  funds.  New  administrators  have  to  learn  by  ex- 
perience, and  in  doing  so  things  are  done  which  conflict  with  pre- 
cedent and  propriety,  partly  because  the  relationships  of  the  local 
institution  are  not  understood.  Under  such  circumstances  disal- 
lowances cause  heartburns  which  do  not  make  for  future  amity. 
At  times  only  a  saving  sense  of  humor  suffices  to  preserve  equan- 
imity and  faith  that  all  is  going  as  well  as  could  be  expected. 

Another  type  of  problem  arises  from  failure  of  the  States  to 
do  their  part.  In  some  cases  the  conditions  necessary  to  carrying 
out  the  requirements  of  the  Morrill  Act  have  come  but  slowly. 
Examples  of  this  have  been  especially  noticeable  in  case  of  some 
of  the  colleges  for  the  colored  race.  In  seventeen  States  separate 
colleges  of  agriculture  and  mechanic  arts  are  maintained  for  that 
race  under  the  land  grant  act.  The  administration  of  Federal 
funds  to  them  has  presented  a  considerable  problem.  In  one  in- 
stance, for  example,  the  situation  became  so  inadequate  it  neces- 
sitated the  proposal  to  withdraw  the  entire  fund  from  the  State 
unless  proper  buildings  and  funds  for  administration  and  main- 
tenance were  provided,  as  a  result  of  which  the  situation  was  cor- 
rected. In  others  the  local  administration  has  been  insistent  on 
stressing  mainly  other  types  of  education,  and  governing  boards 
and  the  local  constituency  could  not  be  depended  upon  to  correct 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  55 

the  difficulty.  It  was  necessary  to  require  one  such  college  to  move 
from  the  midst  of  a  large  city  to  a  location  where  necessary  land 
for  its  agricultural  work  could  be  had. 

The  States  have  often  been  slow  to  realize  their  part  in  con- 
nection with  the  experiment  stations.  There  was  failure  to  pro- 
tect the  station  funds  at  a  time  when  the  Federal  Government  was 
supplying  all  or  nearly  all  of  them;  and  for  a  long  time  the  sta- 
tions were  kept  alive  mainly  through  Government  support.  Up 
to  the  time  the  second  grant  for  them  came  in  the  Adams  Act, 
the  States  were  appropriating,  all  told,  only  a  half  million  dollars, 
or  a  third  less  than  the  general  Government.  While  there  has 
been  great  improvement,  the  appropriation  in  a  quarter  of  the 
States  amounts  to  only  $13,000  or  less,  and  six  stations  receive 
no  State  support.  This  leaves  the  Government's  interest  large  in 
those   States. 

The  increasing  extent  and  machinery  of  regulation  by  the 
States  of  their  educational  institutions  has  reached  a  point  where 
it  constitutes  an  administrative  problem.  Action  of  this  sort  has 
become  so  extreme  in  some  cases  as  to  take  many  of  the  impor- 
tant matters  of  administration  and  the  management  of  funds  out 
of  the  hands  of  the  board  or  authorities  of  the  institutions.  These 
regulatory  provisions  frequently  apply  to  the  Federal  funds,  mak- 
ing it  well-nigh  impossible  to  correct  errors  in  assignment  after 
they  have  been  made,  and  restricting  the  elasticity  in  the  use  of 
both  Federal  and  State  appropriations.  In  other  cases  limita- 
tions on  the  State  monies  tend  to  make  the  Federal  appropria- 
tions a  slush  fund,  used  quite  largely  for  items  not  permitted  on 
the  State  accounts,  such  as  salaries  above  a  specified  amount, 
out-of-State  travel,  emergency  purchases,  and  a  variety  of  other 
purposes.  The  enforced  resort  to  the  Federal  funds  for  miscel- 
laneous items  leads  to  situations  calling  for  special  dispensation, 
and,  what  is  more  serious,  it  prevents  those  funds  from  standing 
for  any  definite,  substantial  efforts.  Their  expenditures  are  so 
scattered  and  fragmentary  that  any  attempt  at  checking  up  neces- 
sarily leads  into  the  entire  work  and  funds  of  the  feature  involved. 
In  the  end  it  is  quite  unsatisfactory. 

The  growth  of  these  institutions,  or  of  special  features  with 
which  we  are  now  concerned,  has  often  reacted  on  the  amount  of 
local  administrative  attention  they  have  received.  With  no  lack 
of  a  general  purpose  to  comply  with  the  spirit  of  the  Federal  meas- 
ures, there  is  frequently  insufficient  provision  for  careful  planning 
and  the  conservation  of  funds  to  their  respective  purposes.  This 
arises  from  a  certain  pooling  of  efforts,  of  responsibilities,  per- 
sonnel, and  funds,  with  a  liberal  exercise  of  the  give-and-take 
spirit.    No  question  of  confidence  or  judgment  may  be  involved, 


56  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

but  the  result  is  no  less  disturbing  to  the  representative  who  is 
concerned  with  the  fortunes  of  a  particular  branch,  as  for  example, 
the  experiment  station.  It  is  a  plain  matter  of  providing  the  neces- 
sary attention  to  preserve  the  different  interests,  the  exercise  of 
discrimination  due  where  a  variety  of  funds  are  involved,  each 
with  its  own  purpose  and  limitations.  It  is  one  of  the  most  serious 
problems  connected  with  our  experiment  stations  today. 

Akin  to  this  is  the  divided  interest  of  the  members  of  the 
force,  the  mixed  duties,  the  sharing  of  time  between  such  separate 
features  as  research,  teaching,  and  extension.  The  division  of 
salary  among  different  funds  which  this  entails  has  always  been 
a  potential  and  frequently  an  actual  source  of  difficulty.  It  re- 
mains to-day,  although  manifestly  infractions  are  inexcusable  at 
this  stage.  It  is  not  that  a  reasonable  combination  of  teaching 
and  research  is  objectionable,  but  that  the  adjustments  are  not 
equitable.  Usually  this  is  due  to  carelessness  or  inattention,  but 
sometimes  it  cannot  be  so  explained. 

It  hardly  needs  to  be  said  that  such  administration  as  the 
Government  attempts  to  maintain  must  depend  for  its  success  on 
a  sympathetic  attitude  and  cooperation  on  the  part  of  both  parties. 
Government  administration  is  far  less  a  matter  of  authority  or 
financial  control  than  it  is  of  counsel  and  cooperation.  This  is 
true,  for  example,  in  the  matter  of  research  projects  of  the  experi- 
ment station.  The  attempt  of  the  supervising  authority  to  bring 
these  upon  a  high  plane  of  originality  or  to  a  point  where  they 
mean  definite  purposeful  inquiry,  as  required  by  the  Adams  Act, 
calls  for  the  active  cooperation  of  the  director,  but  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  this  is  frequently  conspicuous  by  its  absence,  to  use  a  worn 
phrase.  Too  often  the  course  followed  with  a  new  project  is  to 
"try  it  on  the  dog,"  although  realizing  certain  deficiencies  and 
secretly  expecting,  as  subsequently  appears,  that  it  will  not  be 
accepted  without  change.  In  the  correspondence  following  the 
director  functions  chiefly  as  an  intermediary.  Always  a  delicate 
subject  with  the  author  of  the  project  it  is  in  danger  of  becoming 
a  personal  matter  under  such  treatment  and  sometimes  leads  to 
unnecessary  injury  of  feelings. 

Another  tendency  to  sidestep  administrative  questions  of 
troublesome  possibilities  is  sometimes  seen  in  the  request  for 
opinions  and  decisions  on  matters  which  really  fall  under  the  head 
of  local  option.  These  may  voice  a  real  desire  for  counsel,  or 
they  may  arise  from  a  desire  to  "pass  the  buck."  There  are  oc- 
casional indications  that  the  opportunity  to  take  refuge  behind  an 
absent  authority  in  making  unwelcome  decisions  is  appreciated 
even  by  administrative  officers.  With  no  desire  to  shirk  respon- 
sibility and  welcoming  the  opportunity  for  council,  such  practice 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  57 

sometimes  leads  us  into  embarrassment  and  creates  an  impression 
higher  up  of  unwarranted  meddling  in  local  details.  Experience 
has  shown  the  importance  of  avoiding  the  appearance  of  any  such 
motive. 

Again,  it  is  not  unusual  when  administrative  officers  encoun- 
ter objections  they  can  not  surmount  to  appeal  for  rulings  or  in- 
terpretations to  support  them.  To  a  certain  extent  official  rulings 
are  required,  but  as  these  are  necessarily  broad  in  their  applica- 
tion and  become  binding  on  all  institutions  alike,  it  has  been  found 
desirable  to  limit  them  to  fundamental  questions  and  not  to  mul- 
tiply them  unnecessarily.  The  close  contacts  maintained  between 
the  Federal  Departments  and  the  institutions  minimize  the  neces- 
sity for  such  formal  pronouncements. 

On  the  other  hand,  reference  may  be  made  to  an  apparent 
hesitation  at  some  colleges  in  delegating  authority  to  subordinate 
officials  in  charge  of  separate  features.  Beyond  certain  matters 
of  general  policy,  it  is  desirable  that  the  Government  agents  deal 
directly  with  such  officers  as  the  directors  of  the  experiment  sta- 
tion and  the  extension  service,  for  the  higher  administrative  offi- 
cers can  hardly  expect  to  keep  informed  on  the  technicalities  and 
details  involved.  These  higher  officers  naturally  have  control  over 
these  subordinates  and  may  rely  upon  them  to  present  such  mat- 
ters as  call  for  their  attention.  This,  it  would  seem,  would  safe- 
guard the  institution;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  it  is  found  difficult 
to  get  policies  and  agreements  settled,  owing  to  the  reaction  of 
higher  officers  after  authority  supposedly  has  been  conferred  on 
those  in  immediate  charge.  It  is  a  source  of  no  little  embarrass- 
ment, and  gives  rise  to  the  continued  reopening  of  questions  pre- 
sumed to  have  been  settled. 

In  an  enterprise  like  agricultural  extension  the  potentialities 
for  difficulty  are  increased  by  its  novelty  and  because  it  reaches 
outside  the  institution,  involving  the  farmers  and  their  local  or- 
ganizations. Questions  have  constantly  arisen  which  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  single  State  may  seem  local  but  which  really 
are  so  far  reaching  that  the  Department  can  not  avoid  concern- 
ing itself  with  them. 

Take,  for  example,  the  case  of  the  county  agents  and  what 
they  may  properly  do  as  agents  of  the  colleges  in  connection  with 
such  matters  as  cooperative  buying  and  selling  organizations 
among  their  constituents.  The  function  of  extension  is  to  instruct, 
to  supply  information,  to  stimulate  various  activities  among  the 
farmers.  Its  efforts  are  for  all  who  will  take  advantage  of  them 
— not  for  a  few  who  unite  and  press  hardest.  When  the  county 
agents,  yielding  to  such  impulse,  become  the  business  officers  or 
agents  of  buying  and  selling  organizations  they  enter  upon  dan- 


58  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

gerous  ground  and  sooner  or  later  arouse  protests  from  the  public 
which  are  difficult  to  satisfy.  The  Department  has  taken  the 
position  that  they  should  remain  outside  the  actual  business  trans- 
action and  serve  in  an  advisory  capacity  to  the  farmers.  This 
has  pleased  some  and  dissatisfied  others,  and  the  conflict  of  opin- 
ion has  resulted  in  discussion  requiring  a  definite  stand. 

In  all  these  joint  efforts  ultimate  success  must  depend,  of 
course,  upon  getting  together  around  the  spirit  of  the  enterprise, 
what  is  best  for  it  considered  both  locally  and  nationally,  and  for 
this  reason  conference  has  been  carried  to  an  unusual  extent. 
Standardizing  and  stereotyping  need  to  be  avoided,  but  there  are 
national  aspects  of  policies  that  need  to  be  considered  in  con- 
nection with  the  local  program.  A  certain  amount  of  give  and 
take  may  prove  desirable  in  the  interest  of  what  is  best  for  the 
whole  system. 

Manifestly,  there  often  needs  to  be  a  considerable  measure 
of  uniformity  in  what  the  Government  contends  for  and  aims  to 
accomplish,  having  always  in  mind  due  regard  for  the  varying 
conditions  and  requirements  of  the  different  States.  Justice  de- 
mands this.  It  would  not  be  fair  to  maintain  that  one  State  shall 
follow  a  certain  course  and  observe  certain  restrictions,  while  con- 
doning departures  in  another.  If  a  measure  provides  funds  to 
be  used  for  original  research,  there  must  be  a  liberal  definition  of 
the  term  and  it  must  apply  to  the  States  alike.  The  problems  will 
vary,  but  the  general  grade  of  the  effort  should  be  fairly  uniform. 

In  this  frank  presentation  of  some  types  of  problems  which 
come  in  a  varied  experience  with  forty-eight  States,  I  trust  I  may 
not  be  misunderstood  as  implying  any  measure  of  impatience, 
discouragement  or  criticism.  There  is  nothing  in  the  situation  to 
warrant  this.  On  the  contrary,  the  problems  of  administration 
have  steadily  diminished,  and  the  most  cordial  relations  of  frank- 
ness and  desire  for  mutual  understanding  prevail. 

My  purpose  has  been  to  show  that  the  Government  has  an 
administrative  problem,  and  that  it  is  trying  to  work  it  out  with 
as  little  interference  or  restriction  as  possible.  It  has  an  interest 
common  to  all  the  states,  and  between  these  land  grant  colleges 
there  is  community  of  interest.  The  mistakes  or  improprieties 
of  a  few  may  cast  a  wider  shadow,  and  result  to  the  disadvantage 
of  the  whole.  Our  problems  then  are  the  concern  of  the  entire 
system.  If  there  were  no  problems  we  might  indeed  be  adjudged 
superfluous. 


PROBLEMS  OF  STATE  UNIVERSITIES  IN 
ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS 

By  W.  0.  Thompson,  President  of  Ohio  State  University 

HE  program  on  this  occasion  has  already  directed 
our  attention  to  the  fact  of  early  congressional 
appropriations  for  education.  From  the  very  be- 
ginning the  United  States  Congress  appears  to  have 
had  some  sympathetic  attitude  toward  the  ques- 
tion of  the  federal  support  of  education.  The  land 
grants,  such  as  two  townships  in  Ohio  as  the  foundation  of  Ohio 
University  and  one  township  as  the  foundation  of  Miami  Uni- 
versity, indicate  the  early  interest  and  sympathy  with  education. 
It  would  appear  that  the  belief  obtained  that  the  public  lands  be- 
ing the  common  property  of  the  whole  people  might  well  be  set 
aside  for  the  benefit  of  the  universal  enterprise  of  the  country, 
namely:  the  education  of  the  youth.  It  is  not  intimated  here  that 
this  conception  was  clear  in  the  minds  of  many  people  or  that  it 
was  carried  to  any  logical  consistency  but  rather  that  this  view 
of  public  lands  was  sufficiently  recognized  to  encourage  legisla- 
tion. In  many  of  the  commonwealths  a  somewhat  similar  view 
seems  to  have  prevailed  and  public  lands  have  been  set  aside  for 
the  maintenance  and  support  of  public  schools  and  education. 
The  more  recent  views  of  federal  aid  are  based  on  a  somewhat 
different  conception.  They  seem  now  to  look  to  the  elimination 
of  ignorance,  illiteracy  and  the  development  of  industry  and  skill 
as  fundamental  in  the  maintenance  of  national  efficiency  and 
national  welfare.  It  is  in  a  sense,  therefore,  the  belief  in  the 
doctrine  of  self-preservation. 

It  is  a  well-known  fact,  however,  that  two  divergent  views 
have  obtained  among  legislators.  The  one  is  that  education  is  a 
function  of  the  state  and  that  as  such  should  not  be  interrupted 
or  interfered  with  by  any  federal  legislation.  The  Morrill  Act 
under  the  administration  of  Buchanan  received  a  veto  chiefly  on 
this  ground  that  it  was  an  interference  with  the  prerogative  of 
the  state. 

The  other  view  has  been  that  the  federal  government  and 
the  nation  at  large  should  lend  some  aid  and  support  to  the  cause 
of  public  education,  and  this  theory  is  based  upon  the  belief  that 
education  is  not  local  in  its  origin  or  local  in  its  final  effects.  The 
belief  obtains  that  the  fundamental  theory  of  the  federal  govern- 
ment having  the  power  to  lay  its  hand  upon  the  individual  in  the 
enforcement  of  law  and  in  the  defense  of  the  country,  has  the 

59 


60  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

equal  duty  and  obligation  to  reach  this  same  individual  with  such 
facilities  and  assistance  as  will  enable  him  to  become  a  representa- 
tive and  reliable  citizen.  In  addition  to  this  theory  there  is  a 
somewhat  current  belief  that  large  portions  of  the  revenue  for 
the  federal  government  are  collected  from  individuals  and  from 
commonwealths  so  that  the  return  to  the  country  by  way  of  ap- 
propriations of  a  certain  portion  of  the  money  collected  does  not 
violate  any  fundamental  principle.  In  the  progress  of  our  history 
both  of  these  views  have  undergone  some  modification  and  we 
find  ourselves  now  in  a  position  where  the  federal  government 
has  a  history  of  support  through  existing  institutions.  The  most 
important  and  the  most  direct  of  these  contributions  are,  of  course, 
the  Land  Grant  Colleges,  the  Agricultural  Experiment  Stations, 
the  Smith-Lever  Agricultural  Extension  Act  and  such  moneys  as 
are  utilized  through  state  institutions  for  the  carrying  out  of  the 
provisions  of  the  federal  vocational  education  bill,  the  rehabilita- 
tion bill  and  the  guidance  school  for  soldiers.  One  of  these  bills 
is  frankly  a  cooperation  with  the  states  through  state  agencies  in 
the  aid  of  public  schools  in  the  interest  of  a  particular  type  of 
education.  The  others  are  temporary  and  passing  efforts  to  im- 
prove the  condition  of  returned  soldiers  and,  therefore,  do  not 
come  under  consideration  as  involving  any  of  the  permanent  poli- 
cies of  the  government  or  of  the  states. 

The  proposals  recently  made  for  the  establishment  of  a  de- 
partment of  education  with  a  cabinet  member  at  its  head  and  the 
appropriation  of  money  involved  the  enlargement  of  the  sphere 
of  the  Bureau  of  Education,  the  better  recognition  of  education 
within  the  government  and  the  expenditure  of  considerable  sums 
of  money  for  the  purpose  of  making  education  more  efficient  as  a 
great  national  enterprise.  It  is  becoming  increasingly  obvious, 
therefore,  that  whatever  views  may  be  held  concerning  state  edu- 
cation there  is  a  continual  emphasis  upon  the  fact  that  education 
is  a  national  issue.  If  this  view  prevails  we  may,  therefore,  ex- 
pect that  national  revenues  will  be  increasingly  used  and  that  the 
problems  of  the  relations  between  national  and  state  agencies  will 
increase  in  importance. 

It  may  be  worth  while  in  a  preliminary  way  to  state  that 
in  general  the  experience  developed  through  the  federal  aid  to 
education  has  been  less  troublesome  than  might  have  been  ex- 
pected. The  experience  would  not  seem  to  indicate  that  federal 
aid  should  be  discontinued  but  rather  that  it  should  be  so  granted 
as  to  preserve  the  freedom  and  justifiable  autonomy  of  the  states. 
The  discussion  of  the  most  recent  proposals  of  federal  aid  have 
brought  forward  this  consideration  as  one  of  the  grounds  of  op- 
posing the  original  form  in  which  the  bill  was  introduced  propos- 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  61 

ing  a  department  of  education.  There  is  no  doubt  that  in  the 
passing  of  the  years  a  decided  tendency  has  developed  for  the 
federal  government  to  encroach  upon  the  state.  The  theory  of 
sovereignty  in  the  local  state  has  been  somewhat  modified  since 
the  era  of  the  Civil  War.  Indeed  if  the  issue  ever  came  there 
could  be  no  question  about  the  sovereignty  of  the  federal  gov- 
ernment. This  being  once  granted  there  is  always  room  for  de- 
bate as  to  how  far  the  individual  states  are  sovereign  in  the  con- 
trol of  activities  within  their  own  boundaries.  Some  confusion 
has  arisen  from  the  activities  of  national  bodies  like  the  Interstate 
Commerce  Commission  and  other  similar  organizations  proposed 
from  time  to  time.  We  are  not  to  be  surprised,  therefore,  if  in 
the  administration  of  federal  aid  to  the  states  some  serious  prob- 
lems should  arise.  We  are  pleased  rather  that  the  problems  that 
do  arise  are  not  more  serious  than  they  are. 

In  general  it  may  be  said  that  the  problems  of  the  state  uni- 
versities in  administering  federal  aid  fall  under  two  heads;  first, 
the  legal  problems,  and,  second,  the  administrative  problems. 

The  legal  problems  usually  arise  out  of  the  interpretation  of 
the  statutes.  These  interpretations  are  apt  to  be  somewhat  tech- 
nical on  the  one  hand,  while  on  the  other  hand  the  representa- 
tives of  the  federal  government  are  tempted  and  perhaps  dis- 
posed to  quote  the  debates  in  Congress  as  expressing  the  inten- 
tions of  Congress  in  enacting  legislation.  Nothing  is  more  ob- 
vious, however,  than  that  the  acts  of  Congress  as  written  into 
law  do  not  correspond  very  closely  to  the  more  or  less  incoherent 
debates  that  occur  prior  to  the  passing  of  the  legislation.  The 
discussion  over  the  place  as  well  as  the  importance  of  the  special- 
ist in  agricultural  extension  work  is  a  good  example  of  an  honest 
difference  of  opinion.  The  college  ordinarily  believes  such  men 
to  be  essential  to  the  highest  efficiency  of  the  county  agent.  The 
congressional  mind  is  apt  to  regard  the  county  agent  as  the  all- 
sufficient  official  much  as  in  the  older  days  a  college  graduate  was 
expected  to  be  able  to  teach  anything  that  was  necessary  in  a 
college  curriculum.  Liberty,  therefore,  of  progress  is  essential 
in  the  administration  of  either  money  or  of  education. 

Nevertheless  these  two  situations  do  bring  about  some  dif- 
ficulty in  knowing  precisely  what  a  statute  authorizes  and  directs. 
Moreover,  in  the  history  of  any  statute  it  frequently  develops 
that  but  one  phase  of  it  is  under  consideration  at  a  given  time.  A 
decision  is  probably  reached  on  that  particular  phase  of  the 
statute.  Subsequently,  and  probably  under  another  and  different 
administration  and  with  a  new  official  in  charge  some  other  para- 
graph or  phase  of  the  statute  is  up  for  interpretation  and  the  new 
official  may  easily  be  entirely  innocent  of  any  information  as  to 


62  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

the  past  experience  of  the  government  in  operating  the  law.  The 
experience  with  the  Hatch  Act  on  the  part  of  the  Experiment  Sta- 
tions was  such  that  when  the  Adams  Act  was  passed  certain 
strictures  were  made  for  the  purpose  of  avoiding  interpretations 
obtaining  concerning  the  provisions  of  the  Hatch  Act.  A  some- 
what similar  situation  developed  when  in  passing  the  Second 
Morrill  Act  a  restriction  was  placed  upon  the  uses  to  be  made 
of  the  funds  provided  in  that  Act.  In  the  Smith-Lever  Agricul- 
tural Extension  Act  a  very  decided  tendency  was  developed  to 
interpret  the  Act  in  accordance  with  the  declarations  of  mem- 
bers of  Congress  while  the  bill  was  under  debate.  It  was  per- 
fectly obvious  to  intelligent  men  that  the  general  field  of  agricul- 
tural extension  was  not  well  denned  in  the  minds  of  many  and 
that  there  was  great  danger  that  the  statute  might  be  so  inter- 
preted as  to  prevent  any  progress  or  adjustment  to  new  conditions. 
If  the  judgment  of  some  men  had  been  followed  the  practices  in 
many  states  would  have  been  forever  tied  down  to  methods  long 
after  they  were  outgrown  and  obsolete.  The  spirit  of  a  statute 
is  the  abiding  thing  while  in  all  agricultural  education  the  form 
must  be  adjusted  to  the  need  as  developed  from  year  to  year. 
These  legal  interpretations  of  the  statutes  form  the  basis  on  which 
all  educational  practices  must  proceed. 

Speaking  generally,  the  administrative  problems  arise  out  of 
an  effort  to  conform  the  actual  practices  locally  to  the  legal  inter- 
pretations of  the  statute  as  made  by  the  representatives  of  the 
federal  government.  The  fact  that  the  federal  government  itself 
has  no  comprehensive  method  of  dealing  with  its  appropriations 
has  probably  led  in  some  degree  to  a  great  diversity  of  practice 
among  the  departments  and  bureaus  at  Washington.  The  fact 
that  education  is  dealt  with  through  three  or  more  departments 
will  suggest  at  once  the  necessity  of  mutual  understandings  and 
agreements.  The  Association  of  Agricultural  Colleges,  now  known 
as  the  Land  Grant  College  Association,  undertook  some  years 
ago  to  have  a  memorandum  of  understanding  between  the  United 
States  Department  of  Agriculture  and  the  colleges  and  Experi- 
ment Stations  in  order  that  there  might  grow  up  a  series  of  rul- 
ings and  interpretations  consistent  with  a  just  administration  of 
the  agricultural  extension  act  and  a  proper  consideration  of  the 
local  interests. 

Speaking  for  the  moment  with  special  reference  to  the  agri- 
cultural extension  act  because  it  is  the  most  outstanding  at  pres- 
ent, one  may  say  that  the  problems  here  are  undergoing  a  pro- 
cess of  solution.  At  the  outset  it  was  a  question  of  book-keeping. 
The  effort  made  to  expend  this  money  under  what  was  known 
as  the  project  system  rendered  it  somewhat  difficult  for  the  ordi- 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  63 

nary  institution  to  have  its  accounts  in  such  shape  as  to  present 
its  bills  in  harmony  with  the  interpretation  of  projects  as  made 
in  Washington.  This  and  other  factors  presented  another  prob- 
lem in  the  way  of  delay  in  payment.  The  examiners  whose  busi- 
ness it  was  to  check  up  on  accounts  could  not  always  report 
promptly  on  time  for  service  and  when  reports  were  submitted 
and  subjected  to  criticism  the  time  for  revision  made  a  delay 
necessary.  Furthermore,  the  examiners  and  inspectors  changed 
from  time  to  time  of  necessity,  and  few  of  them  were  informed 
as  to  judgments  of  their  predecessors.  In  many  instances  ac- 
counts had  been  allowed  to  be  disallowed  later.  The  customs  of 
one  year  were  not  always  consistent  with  the  customs  of  a  pre- 
ceding year  or  a  succeeding  year.  The  local  officials  in  the  uni- 
versities have  not  always  found  it  easy  to  know  just  what  was 
desired  on  the  part  of  the  federal  government.  These  discussions 
concerning  the  details  of  the  expenditure  of  money  are  not  funda- 
mental but  they  are  extremely  annoying  and  cause  inconvenience 
to  the  institution  receiving  the  delayed  payments. 

In  the  earlier  days,  at  any  rate,  there  was  a  slight  tendency 
recognized  on  the  part  of  federal  authorities  to  control  appoint- 
ments and  salaries.  Happily  this  tendency  is  declining.  It  is 
quite  natural,  however,  for  the  power  of  the  purse  to  assert  itself 
concerning  the  personnel  to  whom  the  money  eventually  goes. 
It  became  very  obvious,  however,  that  in  the  local  appointments 
to  state  service  the  institution  immediately  in  charge  was  the 
more  responsible  and  that  wise  administration  required  that  the 
responsibility  be  centered  upon  the  institution  of  the  state.  Per- 
sons familiar  with  the  experience  will  recall  that  salaries  of  ex- 
tension workers  were  quite  out  of  range  for  a  time  with  the  sal- 
aries of  teachers  with  a  superior  education  and  experience.  It  is 
probably  true  that  the  federal  authorities  did  not  altogether 
appreciate  the  embarrassments  arising  out  of  the  adjustments  of 
salaries.  In  the  long  run  there  will  be  greater  flexibility  in  sal- 
aries controlled  and  directed  by  state  authorities  than  in  those 
controlled  through  congressional  act  or  federal  interpretation. 

In  this  connection  a  suggestion  may  be  offered  that  there 
develops  a  natural  tendency  to  control  the  character  of  the  service 
to  be  rendered  by  extention  workers.  It  is  easy  to  see  that  from 
the  standpoint  of  wider  experience  federal  officers  from  Wash- 
ington might  disagree  in  judgment  with  local  state  officials  as  to 
the  kind  of  service  to  be  rendered  in  the  country  at  large.  It  is 
conceivable  that  they  may  have  greater  wisdom  as  to  the  needs 
of  particular  states  than  officials  living  in  those  states.  This,  how- 
ever, would  not  be  a  normal  situation.  The  cure  for  such  a  sit- 
uation would  be  worse  than  the  disease  itself.    The  final  respon- 


64  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

sibility  for  the  character  of  service  to  be  rendered  in  the  general 
field  of  education  locally  must  rest  with  the  local  authorities; 
otherwise  education  will  fail  to  develop  its  very  best  fruits.  The 
administrative  problem,  therefore,  between  the  federal  govern- 
ment and  state  governments  on  such  issues  must  recognize  the 
superior  responsibility  of  the  state  officials. 

This  leads  me  to  say  that  in  the  administration  between  fed- 
eral and  state  authorities  there  is  manifest  a  tendency  to  neglect 
the  important  matter  of  co-ordinating  all  educational  activities. 
The  federal  government  is  interested,  for  example,  in  pushing  the 
cause  of  education  in  the  trades  and  industries.  Or  perhaps  in 
some  vocational  form  of  education.  In  order  to  carry  the  pro- 
gram into  effect  the  state  must  cooperate  in  providing  funds. 
These  funds  must  be  exclusively  used  for  the  specific  purpose 
named  in  the  Act.  This  may  throw  out  of  balance  the  program 
of  education  in  a  particular  community  or  it  may  not.  It  may 
thrust  into  a  pretty  well  established  program  a  factor  however 
valuable  in  itself  that  does  not  fit  with  the  general  program  of 
the  community.  It  may  also  disturb  the  financial  balance  of  the 
budget  of  a  board  of  education.  At  this  point  the  federal  gov- 
ernment is  apt  to  be  exacting,  somewhat  technical  in  its  interpre- 
tations and  a  little  indifferent  toward  anything  else  than  that  in 
which  the  statute  has  expressed  an  interest.  When  we  recall  that 
education  as  a  universal  and  community-wide  program  must  keep 
the  entire  community  within  its  horizon  we  can  understand  the 
disturbing  effect  of  a  particular  feature  of  education  somewhat 
more  strongly  supported  than  the  general  features  of  the  com- 
munity program.  In  a  considerable  number  of  communities  a 
certain  reaction  has  been  discovered  already  amounting  to  dis- 
content which  is  liable  to  terminate  in  discrediting  the  forms  of 
education  to  which  the  federal  government  is  committed. 

I  may  speak  briefly  of  a  concrete  instance  as  illustrating  a 
small  and  somewhat  unimportant  situation.  For  example,  five 
percent  had  been  allowed  for  publications.  Under  this  statute 
a  given  estimate  had  been  made  for  the  expense  of  the  publica- 
tion. When  the  bills  were  presented  they  exceeded  the  estimate 
but  still  fell  below  the  five  percent  authorized  in  the  statute.  Such 
an  item  was  not  allowed  by  federal  authorities.  The  petty  annoy- 
ance of  adjusting  a  situation  like  that  is  not  serious  but  suggests 
what  has  already  been  hinted  in  this  paper  that  technical  inter- 
pretations and  differing  methods  of  accounting  often  retard  the 
promptness  of  the  service  and  through  the  dissatisfaction  created 
discount  the  efficiency  of  the  enterprise. 

The  experience  of  the  Experiment  Stations  with  the  Hatch 
and  Adams  Acts  is  now  of  so  long  standing  that  the  more  serious 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  6$ 

administrative  difficulties  have  been  disposed  of.  The  experience 
with  the  administration  of  the  funds  from  the  Morrill  Act  pre- 
sents little  trouble  for  the  chief  reason  that  this  money  is  usually 
expended  for  salaries.  The  rapid  growth  of  the  institutions  and 
the  development  of  their  salary  fund  has  made  it  rather  easy  in 
most  cases  to  assign  the  Morrill  funds  to  salaries  and  thus  avoid 
a  large  number  of  administrative  difficulties  in  checking  up  other 
forms  of  expenditures. 

The  Smith-Hughes  Act  has  presented  very  few  administra- 
tive difficulties  for  the  reason  that  it  has  been  administered  un- 
der an  agency  which  has  provided  for  the  advanced  payment  of 
bills  and  the  reimbursement  for  the  local  authorities  at  stated 
periods.  The  project  system  and  a  reasonably  clear  understand- 
ing between  the  federal  and  state  authorities  has  made  this  kind 
of  administration  rather  easy.  The  State  Board  of  Education 
which  has  usually  been  the  agency  through  which  this  bill  has 
been  administered  seems  to  have  been  confronted  with  fewer 
administrative  problems.  The  reason  will  at  once  be  recognized, 
namely:  that  the  work  provided  under  this  Act  is  much  more 
simple  than  the  work  provided  under  so  comprehensive  an  act 
as  the  Agricultural  Extension  Service.  The  variety  of  activity 
possible  under  such  a  title  as  agricultural  extension  has  raised  in 
every  community  its  own  agricultural  extension  problems. 

There  are  two  other  forms  of  education  in  which  many  of 
the  Land  Grant  Colleges  and  State  Universities  have  been  in- 
terested. The  Guidance  School  is  a  school  for  the  education  of 
soldiers  not  prepared  for  university  work  but  too  advanced  in 
years  to  be  properly  within  the  administration  of  elementary  or 
high  schools.  Furthermore  these  candidates  are  not  easily  classi- 
fied upon  any  educational  basis.  It  results,  therefore,  in  much 
individual  instruction,  some  direction  and  guidance,  together  with 
an  effort  to  suit  the  course  of  instruction  to  the  needs  or  tastes 
of  the  particular  soldier.  This  is  a  temporary  phase  of  federal 
interest  and  no  doubt  has  reached  its  maximum  in  attendance. 
The  guarantee,  for  example,  at  Ohio  State  University  for  this  year 
is  50;  the  actual  attendance  is  24.  This  feature  of  education, 
therefore,  will  soon  disappear  from  further  consideration. 

The  other  movement  for  the  education  of  disabled  soldiers 
will  run  its  course  in  a  few  years  and  probably  reach  its  maxi- 
mum either  this  year  or  next  year.  There  are  some  problems  in 
the  administration  of  the  funds  for  such  education.  I  have  had 
brought  to  my  attention  the  fact  that  vouchers  have  been  ob- 
jected to  but  later  agreed  to  when  the  terms  of  the  contract  had 


66  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

been  made  the  subject  of  discussion  and  agreement.  The  same 
tendency  here  to  be  technical  in  interpretation  as  elsewhere  has 
presented  problems  that  are  somewhat  unfortunate  inasmuch  as 
they  tend  to  increase  a  discontented  state  of  mind  altogether  too 
obvious  in  the  returned  soldier.  In  an  instance  passing  under 
my  own  observation  objection  was  made  by  the  federal  govern- 
ment to  the  payment  of  a  fee  for  a  locker  in  a  gymnasium.  Phy- 
sical education  was  down  as  a  requirement  but  for  some  reason 
the  catalog  had  not  stated  that  a  fee  was  necessary.  Out  of 
this  grew  a  controversy.  Penalties  for  late  registration  or  for 
other  infringement  of  rules  cannot  be  enforced  on  the  technical 
interpretation  that  the  government  cannot  be  penalized.  The 
fact  that  the  government  pays  a  bill  seems  to  carry  with  it  the 
government  own  right  to  interpret  what  is  proper  or  improper, 
legal  or  illegal. 

I  would  not  have  you  understand  that  these  unimportant 
details  are  presented  for  the  purpose  of  magnifying  them.  They 
are  presented  rather  for  the  purpose  of  illustrating  how  very  easily 
a  controversy  arises  over  the  interpretation  of  statutes  and  how 
difficult  it  is  to  administer  funds  for  such  purposes  in  the  same 
way  in  which  you  administer  the  rules  obtaining  in  the  case  of 
the  ordinary  student  at  the  University.  In  other  words,  the  fact 
that  one  is  under  the  direct  jurisdiction  of  the  United  States 
seems  to  carry  with  it  in  the  minds  of  many  the  feeling  that 
ordinary  rules  do  not  obtain  and  cannot  be  enforced.  This  same 
point  of  view  often  obtains  with  reference  to  the  larger  issues  of 
administration  and  the  more  important  principles  involved  in 
the  adjustment  of  educational  theory  between  the  federal  and  the 
state  governments.  Experience,  therefore,  would  seem  to  indicate 
that  unless  the  federal  government  can  see  its  way  clear  to  leave 
a  large  amount  of  discretion  in  the  authorities  representing  the 
state  there  is  good  reason  to  doubt  the  wisdom  of  cooperative 
effort  in  the  field  of  education.  This  position  will  be  strengthened 
from  year  to  year  as  the  educational  experience  of  the  states  de- 
velops. More  than  once  has  the  sentiment  been  expressed  in 
the  meetings  of  the  National  Association  of  State  Universities 
that  great  diversity  is  highly  desirable  among  the  state  universi- 
ties. Prominent  men  in  this  organization  have  asserted  that  their 
experience  as  well  as  their  observation  convinces  them  that  any 
effort  at  uniformity  among  state  universities  would  in  the  end 
prove  hurtful  rather  than  helpful.  In  other  words,  these  men 
seem  to  believe  profoundly  that  the  great  function  of  a  state  uni- 
versity is  to  render  the  service  demanded  or  needed  by  the  con- 
ditions existing  in  a  particular  commonwealth.  This  theory  is 
not  precisely  the  theory  upon  which  the  ordinary  college  on  a 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  67 

private  foundation  proceeds.  These  colleges  seem  to  assume  that 
they  have  a  particular  mission  with  reference  to  education,  with 
reference  to  leadership  of  educated  persons  and  with  reference  to 
the  maintenance  of  certain  educational  ideals  and  traditions.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  state  university  is  coming  to  feel  with  in- 
creasing emphasis  that  its  great  fundamental  mission  is  to  render 
a  service  to  the  people  of  the  commonwealth  through  its  organ- 
ized educational  agencies. 

Unless  I  misinterpret  the  sentiment  among  public  school 
men  throughout  the  country,  it  is  clear  that  they  are  steadily 
coming  to  the  belief  that  the  mission  of  the  public  educational 
institution  is  to  discover  if  possible  the  needs  of  society  and  to 
minister  to  these  needs  through  an  education  adapted  to  the  sit- 
uation. They  believe  that  such  a  process  will  create  the  highest 
ideals  in  education  and  develop  the  greatest  national  strength. 
If  such  a  point  of  view  is  to  be  accepted  as  correct,  then  the  fed- 
eral government  will  immeasurably  fail  if  it  undertakes  to  insist 
upon  the  domination  or  control  of  education  through  acts  of  Con- 
gress or  a  federal  agency.  There  always  will  be  a  place  for 
federal  supervision  and  inspection  but  a  much  smaller  place  for 
federal  control.  The  administration,  therefore,  of  education  what- 
ever form  it  may  take  should  recognize  the  administrative  impor- 
tance of  the  commonwealth  as  superior  to  the  importance  of  the 
federal  government.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  by  far  the  greater  por- 
tion of  the  revenues  must  eventually  be  collected  locally.  The 
administration  of  the  entire  sums  devoted  to  education  requires 
that  each  community  make  an  accounting  to  itself,  a  deliberate 
study  of  its  program  and  be  responsible  for  a  suitable  adminis- 
tration of  the  funds.  The  function  of  the  federal  government, 
therefore,  in  such  connection  is  that  of  supplementary  service 
based  upon  the  national  need  for  education. 


DISCUSSION 

After  President  Thompson  had  finished  reading  his  paper,  the 
whole  matter  of  Federal  legislation  bearing  on  education  was 
thrown  open  to  discussion. 

Frederick  Blackmar  Mumford,  Dean  of  the  College  of  Agriculture, 
University  of  Missouri,  Columbia,  Missouri 
We  have  all  been  impressed  with  the  fact  that  the  formal  papers  presented 
at  this  conference  have  clearly  indicated  the  major  problems  involved  in  Federal 
aid  to  education.    There  are,  however,  one  or  two  phases  of  the  question  which 
may  be  still  further  emphasized. 

A  great  many  officials  who  deal  with  the  Federal  Government  in  educational 
matters  where  control  by  the  Federal  authorities  is  attempted  believe  that  the 
Federal  administration  is  interfering  with  the  efficiency  of  the  work.  There  is 
also  a  small  group  of  people  who  are  opposed  to  administration  of  any  sort. 
From  their  point  of  view  a  university  president  is  a  necessary  evil,  while  deans 
and  directors  of  scientific  research  are  unnecessary  evils.  It  is  obvious  that  this 
group  would  be  opposed  to  Federal  administration  or  any  other  sort  of  control. 

I  am  particularly  interested  in  the  relation  of  the  Federal  Government  to 
scientific  research  and  agricultural  extension.  Federal  funds  now  available  for 
scientific  research  in  Land  Grant  institutions  have  been  subjected  to  little  ad- 
ministration by  the  Federal  authorities.  There  has  been  no  effort  to  control 
research.  These  funds,  moreover,  are  not  appropriated  by  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment on  condition  that  the  states  appropriate  an  equal  amount.  Experience 
has  demonstrated  that  this  method  of  Federal  aid  to  scientific  research  has  re- 
sulted in  nothing  but  good.  The  small  appropriation  from  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment has  been  duplicated  many  times  by  the  states.  Practically  every  state 
in  the  Federal  Union  now  appropriates  more  money  for  agricultural  research 
than  is  received  from  the  Federal  Government. 

The  same  situation  obtains  in  connection  with  the  Morrill  funds  for  teach- 
ing. These  funds  are  given  to  the  states  outright.  They  are  not  subject  to 
state  offset.  The  states  have  appropriated  much  more  for  teaching  agriculture 
in  the  Land  Grant  colleges  than  has  been  received  by  the  states  from  the  Fed- 
eral Government. 

The  appropriations  for  agricultural  extension,  however,  are  on  an  entirely 
different  basis,  both  from  the  standpoint  of  acceptance  by  the  state  and  from 
the  standpoint  of  Federal  control.  The  moneys  appropriated  for  agricultural 
extension  are  given  to  the  states  on  condition  that  the  states  appropriate  an 
equal  amount.  The  Federal  Government  has  controlled  not  only  the  Federal 
funds  appropriated  to  the  states,  but  indirectly  the  money  appropriated  by  the 
states  themselves.  This  policy  of  Federal  control  has  not  been  productive  of 
good.  It  is  opposed  by  those  who  are  most  concerned  and  it  has  not  resulted 
in  increasing  the  efficiency  of  the  extension  work. 

It  is  my  opinion  that  the  principle  is  wrong.  No  Federal  appropriation  to 
the  states  should  be  so  made  that  further  appropriation  for  the  same  purpose 
made  by  the  states  shall  come  under  Federal  control.  It  is  wholly  impossible 
for  a  Federal  official  located  in  Washington  to  effectively  administer  or  control 
agricultural  extension  or  agricultural  research  in  such  widely  separated  districts 
requiring  such  widely  different  methods  and  subjects  of  research  or  extension. 

Under  the  law  the  extension  work  is  supposed  to  be  cooperative  between 
the  Federal  Government  and  the  states.  This,  however,  is  a  misnomer.  Co- 
operation is  a  mutual  arrangement,  each  party  to  the  cooperation  having  equal 
powers  and  the  final  policies  are  the  result  of  mutual  concessions  and  com- 
promise. But  the  agricultural  extension  work  as  now  administered  by  the  Fed- 
eral Department  of  Agriculture  is  in  no  sense  cooperative.  The  states  do  not 
have  an  equal  rank  in  the  negotiations.     It  is  doubtful  whether  cooperation  in 

68 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  69 

any  proper  sense  of  the  term  can  ever  be  arranged  between  the  Federal  Gov- 
ernment and  a  state,  because  in  the  last  analysis  the  Federal  Government  must 
be  supreme  in  its  authority.  For  administrative  reasons  it  is  more  convenient 
to  organize  a  machine  for  conducting  extension  work  which  shall  be  the  same 
in  each  state.  This  machine  must  be  used  whether  it  is  satisfactory  to  a  par- 
ticular state  or  not.  It  is  my  opinion  that  Federal  control  of  agricultural  ex- 
tension has  not  been  wholly  satisfactory  and  cannot  be.  In  making  this  state- 
ment, however,  I  want  it  to  be  distinctly  understood  that  I  am  not  criticising 
any  official  of  the  Federal  Government  or  suggesting  that  they  have  not  sincerely 
tried  to  remove  all  the  objections  possible.     It  is  the  system  that  is  wrong. 

Dean  Charles  E.  Chadsey,  University  of  Illinois 
The  very  fact  that  we  have  called  this  conference  must  indicate  that  there 
are  two  sides  to  this  whole  matter  and  that  we  are  here  not  for  the  purpose  of 
absolutely  determining  that  one  line  of  thought  eliminates  the  other,  but  for  the 
purpose  of  seeing  whether  out  of  this  conference  there  may  not  come  a  unity 
of  judgment  to  enable  us  to  go  forward  and  accomplish  things  worth  while. 

I  have  spent  most  of  my  life  in  education  in  the  administration  of  public 
schools  and  I  have  been  thinking  along  these  lines.  Therefore,  very  largely  from 
that  point  of  view  and  the  contacts  which  I  have  had  with  public  school  men 
and  with  public  school  problems,  I  realize  that  there  is  on  the  part  of  the  public 
school  people  of  the  country  a  strong  desire  that  we  may  eventually  secure  a 
Department  of  Education  with  a  Secretary  in  the  Cabinet.  That  is  a  matter  of 
common  knowledge.  It  is  something  which  has  been  before  educational  gather- 
ings for  twenty-five  years.  I  think  that  one  of  the  reasons  that  has  made  many 
public  school  men  believe  in  this  has  been  a  conviction  that  the  Bureau  of  Edu- 
cation with  its  very  limited  resources  has  been  unable  to  do  as  much  for  educa- 
tion as  it  ought  to  do,  and  that  education  as  one  of  the  great  interests  of  the 
state  and  nation  has  not  been  properly  supported  in  a  national  way.  There  has 
been  a  desire  to  see  in  Washington  an  organization  which  could  in  a  very  sys- 
tematic way  indicate  the  study  of  educational  problems  to  better  advantage 
than  they  can  be  undertaken  with  state  organizations  or  local  assistance. 

I  have  come  in  contact  with  the  Smith-Hughes  Bill,  when  certain  Boards 
of  Education  had  their  budgets  thrown  out  of  proportion.  Teachers  of  agricul- 
tural education  have  received  larger  salaries  than  the  superintendent.  Things 
of  that  sort  are  annoying.  I  am  wondering  whether  it  is  not  possible  after  all 
to  develop  a  department  of  education  which  may  do  many  of  these  things  which 
I  know  many  of  the  educators  wish  to  have  done,  which  may  provide  for  a  study 
which  has  not  characterized  much  of  the  work  of  the  Bureau  of  Education  and 
which  may  at  the  same  time  eliminate  these  features.  In  other  words,  do  the 
objections  which  have  been  presented  as  to  the  fifty-fifty  plan  carry  with  them 
the  necessity^  of  disapproving  the  idea  of  a  Federal  Department  of  Education? 
Or  is  it  possible  to  separate  these  questions  in  some  permanent  fashion  so  that 
there  may  be  the  recognition  of  the  importance  of  education  nationally  and  get 
an  elimination  of  the  evils  which  can  easily  develop? 

Hugh  S.  Magill,  Field  Secretary,  National  Education  Association 
I  am  much  impressed  with  what  Dr.  Chadsey  has  just  said.  As  a  repre- 
sentative of  the  National  Education  Association,  I  wish  to  say  that  the  Asso- 
ciation is  definitely  committed  in  opposition  to  Federal  control  of  education 
within  the  states.  Its  position  on  this  subject  has  been  expressed  definitely  in 
resolutions  adopted  repeatedly  at  its  annual  conventions.  The  Association  favors 
a  Department  of  Education  with  a  Secretary  in  the  President's  Cabinet,  and 
Federal  aid  so  administered  as  not  to  interfere  with  the  conduct  and  management 
of  education  b>y  state  and  local  educational  authorities.  After  a  careful  study 
of  this  ^  question  I  am  thoroughly  convinced  that  such  a  plan  can  be  carried 
out  satisfactorily. 


70  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

Attention  has  been  called  to  the  early  Federal  Grants  for  education  con- 
tained in  the  Morrill  Act,  the  Hatch  Act,  and  others.  We  have  been  reminded 
that  the  first  act  _  proposing  Federal  aid  was  vetoed  by  President  Buchanan  on 
the  ground  that  it  was  an  encroachment  upon  the  doctrine  of  States'  Rights, 
but  that  this  act  in  practically  the  same  form  was  later  repassed  by  Congress 
and  signed  by  President  Lincoln.  Dean  Davenport  pointed  out  clearly  in  his 
splendid  address  the  great  benefits  that  had  accrued  to  education  as  a  result  of 
these  acts.  It  is  conceded  that  in  the  more  recent  Federal  aid  bills,  the  Smith- 
Lever  and  the  Smith-Hughes  Acts,  there  has  been  more  of  Federal  supervision 
and  that  because  of  this  fact  there  are  those  who  have  become  somewhat  sus- 
picious of  Federal  participation  in  the  promotion  of  education.  President  Thomp- 
son has  pointed  out  some  of  the  annoyances  that  have  been  encountered  in  the 
administration  of  these  later  acts,  but  he  did  not  lead  is  to  conclude  that  be- 
cause of  these  minor  annoyances  Federal  aid  to  education,  even  under  the  pro- 
visions of  the  Smith-Lever  and  the  Smith-Hughes  Acts,  has  not  proven  advan- 
tageous to  education  in  the  states. 

President  Kinley  called  attention  in  his  address  last  night  to  instances  of 
friction  between  the  University  and  the  Federal  Government  in  the  administra- 
tion of  Federal  grants.  But  I  think  it  could  be  shown  that  this  University  has 
not  encountered  greater  difficulty  in  dealing  with  the  Federal  Government  than 
it  has  in  dealing  with  the  Illinois  State  Legislature.  To  be  perfectly  fair,  we 
must  recognize  that  differences  of  opinion  are  sure  to  arise,  and  that  because  of 
such  differences  we  are  not  justified  in  concluding  that  cooperation  is  impossi- 
ble. I  remember  very  well  when  I  was  a  member  of  the  Illinois  Senate  that 
President  James  and  Dean  Kinley  at  that  time  pointed  out  to  me  the  embar- 
rassment caused  to  the  University  by  the  fact  that  the  Legislature  was  so 
specific  in  making  its  appropriations.  It  frequently  happened  in  the  administra- 
tion of  the  affairs  of  the  University  that  certain  departments  would  have  a  surplus 
of  funds,  while  other  departments  would  be  greatly  hampered  for  need  of  funds, 
but  it  was  impossible  to  transfer  funds  from  where  they  were  not  needed  to 
places  where  they  were  greatly  needed  because  of  specific  action  taken  by  the 
Legislature. 

I  want  to  call  your  particular  attention  to  the  fact  that  the  Towner-Sterling 
bill,  creating  a  Department  of  Education  and  providing  Federal  aid  to  the  states 
for  the  promotion  of  education,  provides  specifically  that  all  funds  apportioned 
to  the  respective  states  shall  be  distributed  and  administered  in  accordance  with 
state  laws.     I  wish  to  quote  the  provisions  of  the  bill  on  this  subject: 

"All  funds  apportioned  to  a  State  shall  be  distributed  and  admin- 
istered in  accordance  with  the  laws  of  said  State  in  like  manner  as  the 
funds  provided  by  State  and  local  authorities  for  the  same  purpose,  and 
the  State  and  local  educational  authorities  of  said  State  shall  determine 
the  courses  of  study,  plans,  and  methods  for  carrying  out  the  purposes 
of  this  act  within  said  State  in  accordance  with  the  laws  thereof." 
Also  the  following: 

"Provided,  That  all  the  educational  facilities  encouraged   by  the 
provisions  of  this  Act  and  accepted  by  a  State  shall  be  organized,  super- 
vised, and  administered  exclusively  by  the  legally  constituted  State  and 
local  educational  authorities  of  said  State,  and  the  Secretary  of  Educa- 
tion shall  exercise  no  authority  in  relation  thereto;  and  this  Act  shall 
not  be  construed  to  imply  Federal  control  of  education  within  the  States, 
nor  to  impair  the  freedom  of  the  States  in  the  conduct  and  management 
of  their  respective  school  systems." 
It  seems  to  me  the  whole  problem  resolves  itself  into  this   simple   question: 
Can  Federal  aid  be  granted  to  the  states  for  the  promotion  of  education  without 
interfering  with  the  constitutional  right  of  the  state  to  control  its  educational 
system?     We  must  all  agree  that  under  the  provisions  of  the  Federal  constitu- 
tion the  control  of  education  within  a  state  is  exclusively  a  state  function.     I 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  71 

think  we  must  also  agree  that  in  accordance  with  the  terms  of  the  Towner- 
Sterling  bill  this  constitutional  right  of  the  state  is  very  fully  and  definitely 
preserved.  President  Kinley  stated  yesterday  at  the  close  of  Dr.  Capen's  ad- 
dress that  in  his  opinion  if  the  Federal  Government  granted  money  to  the 
states  for  the  promotion  of  education,  it  would  necessarily  result  in  Federal 
control,  notwithstanding  the  specific  provisions  within  the  Act  to  the  contrary. 
I  am  not  willing  to  accept  President  Kinley's  views  on  this  subject.  I  believe 
that  laws  must  be  administered  in  accordance  with  the  provisions  of  law. 
Every  administrative  officer  and  every  court  is  so  bound  by  oath.  It  is,  to  say 
the  least,  a  sad  commentary  on  free  government  to  hold  that  it  is  impossible 
to  carry  out  the  provisions  of  the  Federal  Constitution  and  the  definite  pro- 
visions of  an  act  of  Congress. 

The  justification  for  free  schools  supported  by  public  taxation  is  the  devel- 
opment of  a  more  intelligent  citizenship,  but  the  state  can  be  no  more  interested 
in  the  development  of  its  citizenship  than  is  the  Federal  Government.  The 
citizenship  of  our  Nation  as  a  whole  is  but  the  aggregate  citizenship  of  all  the 
states.  The  Federal  Government  can  well  afford  to  promote  education  within 
the  states,  even  though  the  control  of  education  must  be  left  exclusively  under 
state  control,  on  the  ground  that  the  Nation  will  share  with  the  states  the 
benefits  accruing  from  education. 

Under  the  provisions  of  the  Towner-Sterling  bill  Federal  cooperation  in 
support  of  education  rests  on  the  assumption  that  each  state  may  be  depended 
upon  to  wisely  expend  money  appropriated  by  the  Federal  Government  because 
the  money  so  appropriated  must  be  expended  in  the  same  manner  as  the  money 
provided  for  the  same  purpose  by  state  and  local  authorities.  Each  state  is 
permitted  to  spend  its  Federal  grant  exactly  as  it  spends  it  own  money,  and 
the  Federal  Government  will  share  the  results  accruing  therefrom  in  a  more 
intelligent  citizenry. 

I  am  a  citizen  of  Illinois,  born  and  raised  in  Illinois.  I  love  my  home  state. 
I  love  this  University.  But  I  love  my  country  more,  and  I  have  faith  in  the 
ability  of  our  Nation  to  cooperate  successfully  with  the  states  in  the  promotion 
of  that  which  alone  can  make  America  equal  to  the  great  tasks  which  lie  before 
her.  Who  will  question  that  the  future  of  America  depends  very  largely  upon 
the  character  of  her  citizens;  that  the  intelligence  and  strength  of  that  citizen- 
ship must  depend  very  largely  upon  education;  that  while  under  our  dual  form 
of  government  the  conduct  of  public  education  is  a  function  of  the  state,  never- 
theless the  Nation  cannot  escape  the  disastrous  results  which  must  follow  a  lack 
of  education;  and  that  because  of  these  facts  our  Nation  for  its  own  prosperity 
and  security  should  aid  and  encourage  the  states  in  the  promotion  of  education. 

W.  S.  Sutton,  Dean,  College  of  Education,  University  of  Texas, 
Justin,  Texas 
I  think  it  is  perfectly  clear  that  everybody  here  loves  the  United  States 
government;  at  any  rate,  it  is  not  in  order  to  question  anybody's  loyalty.  I 
have  lived  in  the  South  all  my  life.  I  happened  accidentally  to  be  the  son  of  a 
Confederate  soldier;  but  it  would  be  scandalous  if  I  should  make  up  my  judg- 
ments on  account  of  my  geographical  location  or  my  ancestry.  The  question 
at  issue  is  not  whether  we  love  the  national  or  the  state  government.  It  is  not 
a  question  of  mere  expediency,  involving  only  educational  matters,  but  one  of 
politics  and  government.  There  is  much  difference  of  opinion,  and  to  thresh 
out  the  many  disagreements  would  keep  us  here  three  or  four  weeks  instead  of 
two  days. 

In  the  first  place,  it  is  fundamentally  wrong,  this  new  scheme  for  the 
promotion  of  education  by  the  United  States  government,  because  it  tends  to 
a  very  disreputable  sort  of  ambition — the  desire  to  get  something  for  nothing. 
I  am  opposed  emphatically  to  the  fifty-fifty  basis.  We  don't  get  the  fifty  as 
a  gift,  anyway;  it  is  our  money  we  get  back.     It  takes  a  great  deal  of  money, 


72  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

furthermore,  to  collect  it,  to  keep  the  books,  and  to  send  reports  back  and  forth, 
etc.  This  fifty-fifty  business  is  as  bad  for  education  as  for  religion.  The  orig- 
inal plan  of  salvation  differs  widely  from  that  which  some  people  employ  these 
days.  The  original  plan  as  announced  by  its  founder  was  very  simple  and 
easily  understood.  The  new  plan  may  be  described  as  follows:  A  big-lunged, 
well-fed  professional  uplifter  gathers  a  crowd  around  him  and  says,  "Hear  me. 
Seats  in  the  skies  are  going  at  a  dollar  apiece;  if  one  of  you  people  wishes  to 
cinch  a  seat,  put  up  a  half  dollar,  and  I  will  get  some  pious  rich  man  to  put 
up  the  other  half."  Truly,  we  ought  not  to  be  bribed  to  our  duty  in  religion 
or  education. 

One  of  the  real  questions  involved  in  the  problem  before  this  conference, 
is  whether  or  not  the  United  States  Government  ought  to  be  engaged  in  the 
school  affairs  of  the  several  states.  Perhaps  it  ought.  My  view  may  be  en- 
tirely wrong  for  I  believe  the  constitution  forbids  such  activity,  but  that  is  of 
but  little  consequence  to  a  large  number  of  teachers,  for  they  have  never  even 
so  much  as  read  that  historic  document.  Our  constitution  may  be  altogether 
wrong;  if  it  is  a  league  with  hell,  we  ought  to  amend  it.  This  reminds  me  of 
a  story  about  one  of  the  former  Governors  of  Texas,  Oran  M.  Roberts.  A 
gentleman  went  into  his  office  one  day  and  said,  "Look  here,  Governor,  the 
State  of  Texas  is  going  to  hell."  Whereupon  the  Governor  replied,  "She  may 
be  going  to  hell;  but,  if  she  goes  during  my  administration,  she  will  go  ac- 
cording to  law." 

A  few  months  ago  I  took  a  few  days  off  trying  to  determine  whether  the 
Towner-Sterling  fifty-fifty  plan  be  constitutional.  I  first  made  an  investigation 
to  discover  if  the  courts  had  ever  decided  that  matter.  They  have  decided 
everything  else;  but  they  have  been  absolutely  silent  on  this  thing.  On  account 
of  this  silence  some  fifty-fifty  apostles  have  declared  the  bill  is,  therefore,  con- 
stitutional. If  one  has  never  been  caught  and  tried  for  theft,  it  is  positive 
proof  that  he  has  never  stolen  anything,  is  a  kind  of  logic  these  apostles  affect. 
What  does  the  silence  of  the  courts  really  mean?  Simply  this,  that  no  one  has 
ever  been  disposed  to  appeal  to  the  courts  on  this  point,  and  that  we  are  always 
ready  to  take  the  money,  and  we  don't  care  whether  it  be  constitutional  or  un- 
constitutional, right  or  wrong. 

The  peril  of  America,  in  the  judgment  of  many  thoughtful  people,  is  not 
to  be  found  in  the  I.  W.  W's.  It  is  to  be  found  somewhere  else.  It  is  the  love 
of  money  that  is  the  bottom  of  the  trouble,  and  I  fear  any  educational  policy 
that  will  tempt  the  cupidity  of  man. 

One  more  thing  about  the  constitutionality  of  the  Towner-Sterling  Bill. 
Some  time  ago  I  was  looking  through  a  book  entitled  "Congressional  Govern- 
ment," written  by  a  great  man,  a  great  scholar  and  one  of  the  great  prophets 
and  priests  of  democracy,  Woodrow  Wilson.  In  that  work  he  contends  that 
changing  the  constitution  is  such  a  difficult  task,  that  the  machinery  is  so 
complicated  that  it  is  practically  impossible  to  amend  the  Constitution  except 
by  revolution,  that,  in  consequence  we  have  arranged  a  frame-work  of  fictions  by 
which  we  can  change  the  constitution  unconstitutionally.  Rather  a  strange 
doctrine  to  be  preached  by  the  successor  of  Jefferson  and  Madison  isn't  it? 
Furthermore,  Mr.  Wilson,  for  whom  all  Americans  and  all  lovers  of  liberty 
throughout  the  world  should  entertain  the  profoundest  respect,  was,  neverthe- 
less, certainly  mistaken  concerning  the  difficulty  of  amending  the  constitution, 
for,  since  the  publication  of  his  book,  that  instrument  has  been  amended  in  a 
perfectly  legal,  peaceful,  regular  way  four  times.  Now,  inasmuch  as  our  gov- 
ernment is  one  of  law,  not  of  men,  I  seriously  object  to  amending  the  consti- 
tution surreptitiously  or  illegally. 

Another  objection  to  the  fifty-fifty  plan  of  Federal  and  state  cooperation 
in  the  educational  affairs  of  the  states  is  that  the  latter  do  not  need  outside 
aid,  and  should  be  too  self-respecting  either  to  ask  for  it  or  to  receive  it.  There 
is  no  state  in  the  American  Union  so  poverty-stricken  and  so  steeped  in  illiter- 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  73 

acy  and  stupidity  as  to  be  unable  to  maintain  a  respectably  efficient  system 
of  public  education. 

Again  the  friends  of  the  fifty-fifty  policy,  I  fear  were  influenced  unduly  by 
some  of  our  educational  troubles  revealed  by  the  World  War,  and  were,  there- 
fore, impelled  by  a  kind  of  hysteria  to  seek  to  destroy,  almost  over  night,  illit- 
eracy, feebleness  of  body,  inefficiency  in  teachers,  civic  defects  in  citizens  of 
foreign  descent,  and  any  other  afflctions  removable  by  rapid-firing  processes  of 
education  enjoying  the  benevolent  oversight  and  the  generous  grants-in-aid  of 
the  Federal  government.  Our  friends  are  in  too  great  a  hurry.  A  boy  in  col- 
lege does  not  object  to  being  rushed;  but  a  moderately  level-headed  college 
professor  is  decidedly  opposed  to  the  adoption  of  a  far-reaching  policy  before  it 
has  been  given  careful  and  protracted  and  dispassionate  consideration.  If  the 
National  Education  Association  could,  in  ten  years,  induce  Congress  to  pass  a 
bill  which  would  provide  for  the  effective  functioning  of  the  legitimate  educa- 
tional activities  of  our  national  government,  it  would,  in  my  opinion,  render  in 
record-breaking  time  a  service  far  greater  than  it  has  rendered  in  all  the  years 
of  its  history  or  than  its  present  effort  to  put  over  a  measure,  the  merits  of 
which  have  not  yet  been  threshed  out.  Let  me  suggest  that,  to  a  mind  not 
distraught  by  war-hysteria,  it  does  not  seem  absolutely  necessary  that  the 
Towner-Sterling  Bill  or  any  bill  of  similar  scope  and  purport  be  adopted  this 
year  or  even  next.  The  country,  I  am  sure,  will  survive  for  some  years  to 
come,  either  with  or  without  the  aid  of  the  bill.  The  great  majority  of  our 
race  are  inclined  to  take  their  "bills,"  as  well  as  themselves,  too  seriously. 

Many  other  criticisms  can  be  justly  made  against  such  measures  as  the 
Towner-Sterling  Bill;  but  I  shall  not  trespass  upon  your  time  and  patience 
longer  than  to  express  the  opinion,  which  is  firmly  lodged  in  the  minds  of  some 
rather  thoughtful  American  citizens,  that  the  increasing  multiplication  of  Fed- 
eral activities  in  matters  which  belong  to  the  states  is  a  real  danger.  This  is 
the  belief  of  such  representative  public  men  as  Elihu  Root,  and  President  Hard- 
ing. The  gentleman  first  named,  in  an  address  made  in  1916  before  the  Amer- 
ican Bar  Association,  emphatically  condemned  the  interference  of  the  national 
government  in  the  affairs  of  the  states.  In  his  judgment  it  will  destroy  the 
balance  of  our  dual  form  of  government,  and  will  result  in  the  enfeebling  of 
the  states,  and  finally  and  inevitably,  in  the  breaking  up  of  the  Union.  Presi- 
dent Harding,  in  his  Plymouth  Rock  address  declared  that  the  greatest  menace 
to  our  country  to-day  is  the  growing  centralization  of  power  in  Washington, 
thus  encouraging  Congress  to  undertake  duties  which  the  forty-eight  states 
should  eventually  discharge. 

Now,  let  it  be  clearly  understood  that  those  who  favor  the  preservation  of 
state  sovereignty  are  by  no  means  wanting  in  loyalty  to  the  Union.  The  fact 
is  that  one  of  the  chief  reasons  why  they  protest  against  the  exercise  by  Con- 
gress of  powers  not  granted  to  it  by  the  Constitution,  is  that  it  is  hoped  such 
opposition  will  assist  in  preserving  unimpaired  for  future  generations  the  Fed- 
eral government  as  builded  by  the  founders  of  this  great  American  republic. 
Because  we  believe  that  our  country  is  of  far  greater  importance  than  even 
educational  systems,  we  should  not  be  considered  as  enemies  of  either  the  Union 
or  public  education.  On  the  other  hand,  we  should  be  given  credit  for  both 
patriotism  and  sense,  for,  as  that  great  United  States  Senator  from  Georgia, 
Ben  Hill,  once  declared,  "He  who  saves  his  country  saves  all  things,  and  all 
things  saved  do  bless  him.  He  who  lets  his  country  die,  lets  all  things  die,  and 
all  things  dying  curse  him." 

William  Oxley  Thompson,  President,  Ohio  State  University,  Columbus,  Ohio 
We  are  talking  in  this  conference  largely  on  the  experience  of  men  who 
have  had  administrative  questions  to  solve.  We  are  now  entering  upon  a  ques- 
tion that  becomes  a  matter  of  public  policy  because  of  the  seriousness  of  the 
enactments  calling  for  money  and  we  do  not  know  whether  the  next  enactment 
will  be  in  accordance  with  the  educational  bill.  We  are  thinking  of  the  general 
policy  of  the  Federal  Government.    Most  of  us  realize  the  importance  of  educa- 


74  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

tion  and  want  to  have  a  dignified  representative  of  education.  We  do  not  know 
whether  a  member  of  the  cabinet  would  represent  that  dignity.  The  cabinet 
officers  are  subject  to  criticism.  I  have  a  great  regard  for  individual  people, 
but  cabinet  officers  are  always  temporary  officials.  I  do  not  want  to  pin  my 
faith  on  the  future  of  education  to  any  cabinet  man  or  president.  Separation 
of  governmental  affairs  has  not  always  completely  satisfied  the  people. 

G.  H.  Reavis,  Dean  of  the  School  of  Education,  University  of  Pittsburgh 
No  one  up  to  date  had  questioned  the  advisability  of  a  Department  of 
Education  in  the  federal  government  with  a  Secretary  in  the  President's  Cab- 
inet. No  speaker  questioned  it  yesterday  and  at  least  one  of  them  discussed 
it  as  possibly  a  good  thing  to  have;  and  he  discussed  it  through  his  address  as 
though  it  were  a  probability.  I  thought  that  the  attitude  of  this  conference 
on  the  whole  matter  was  that  federal  appropriation  was  a  fine  thing  for  the 
land  grant  colleges.  So  far  as  it  has  come  down  to  state  universities,  it  has 
done  a  most  admirable  thing  and  the  state  university  is  largely  a  result  of  it, 
but  I  might  infer  from  some  things  that  have  been  said  that  the  state  university 
is  afraid  to  let  anybody  else  have  the  things  that  have  made  it  great.  No- 
body questions  the  advisability  of  a  Secretary  of  Education  in  the  President's 
Cabinet.  The  two  big  points  raised  against  the  program  of  the  National  Edu- 
cational Association  are  (a)  That  it  may  be  a  bad  policy  to  appropriate  large 
sums  to  the  states  on  a  fifty-fifty  basis  because  they  may  come  dangerously 
near  draining  all  the  state's  revenue  and  thereby  stunt  something  else  in  the 
state  of  today;  and  (b)  If  we  put  up  a  fifty-fifty  appropriation,  plans  of  con- 
trol are  bound  to  go  with  it. 

The  bill  we  are  discussing  does  not  propose  that  a  state  must  increase  its 
appropriation  for  education  for  any  of  these  lines.  It  merely  says  you  can 
not  take  this  money  and  spend  it  unless  you  are  spending  your  own  money 
for  the  same  purpose.  Several  of  the  states  are  already  spending  enough  so 
that  the  funds  will  match  federal  funds;  and  the  state  that  is  not  providing 
enough  of  that  sort  of  activity  would  have  to  put  up  more  than  it  does  now 
if  it  wants  the  federal  money.     It  is  voluntary  with  the  state. 

I  am  not  a  student  of  political  economy;  but  if  it  is  a  fact  that  the  Fed- 
eral Government  of  these  United  States  cannot  make  a  law  giving  the  states 
this  help  and  encouragement,  without  controlling  education,  it  is  a  sad  commen- 
tary on  democracy — that  the  will  of  the  people  can  not  get  expression  under 
our  form  of  government.  Great  states  like  Illinois,  Ohio,  Pennsylvania,  and 
New  York  can  have  school  systems  such  as  they  have  and  universities  such  as 
this,  while  Tennessee,  Mississippi,  and  others  have  no  such  educational  oppor- 
tunities, and  should  be  helped. 

Eugene  Davenport,  College  of  Agriculture,  University  of  Illinois 
It  is  highly  important  that  our  discussion  should  not  be  confused  by  unim- 
portant details  but  rather  that  we  analyze  the  problem  of  Federal  aid  to  educa- 
tion in  order  to  discover  the  principles  involved.  I  take  it  any  one  of  three 
reasons  may  impel  Congress  to  subsidize  education  in  the  states  of  the  Union. 
i.  A  desire  to  promote  a  particular  piece  of  Federal  work,  as,  for  example, 
the  military  instruction  in  the  Land  Grant  colleges. 

2.  A  desire  to  equalize  educational  opportunity  as  between  the  people  of 
the  richer  and  those  of  the  poorer  states. 

3.  To  initiate  and,  in  its  early  days,  to  stimulate  some  form  of  educational 
activity,  as  in  the  case  of  the  original  Land  Grant  Act. 

It  is  perfectly  clear  that  each  of  these  three  occasions  for  Federal  subsidy 
must  carry  its  own  peculiar  problem.  For  example,  it  is  inconceivable  that  the 
Federal  Government  will  turn  over  to  forty-eight  separate  states  the  policy  of 
conducting  military  education   and  training.     Whatever  constitutional  preroga- 


ADMINISTERING  FEDERAL  FUNDS  75 

tives  belong  to  the  states,  they  will  clearly  be  waived  in  accepting  this  money 
from  Federal  sources. 

The  proposition  to  equalize  educational  opportunity  by  taking  money  from 
the  richer  states  and  turning  it  over  to  the  poorer  is  a  thoroughly  debatable  one. 
It  is  conceivable  but  not  likely  that  Congress  will  appropriate  funds  for  this 
purpose  without  requiring  an  accounting  from  those  to  whom  the  money  goes. 

Our  chief  trouble  has  arisen  under  the  third  heading;  namely,  the  promo- 
tion of  some  new  idea  considered  as  promoting  public  welfare.  It  is  here  that 
the  fifty-fifty  propostion  has  arisen  and  because  the  amounts  involved  may  be- 
come very  large  or  the  lines  of  activity  exceedingly  numerous,  the  question  has 
arisen  in  later  months  whether  a  state  can  maintain  an  educational  policy  of 
its  own  in  the  face  of  rapidly  multiplying  and  growing  Federal  appropria- 
tions, however  worthy  they  may  be. 

John  Henry  MacCracken,  President,  Lafayette  College,  Easton,  Pennsylvania 

I  have  been  interested  in  the  relation  of  the  Federal  Government  to  educa- 
tion for  a  number  of  years  and  yet  have  not  been  connected  with  a  state  insti- 
tution nor  had  to  do  with  Federal  or  State  vouchers  except  during  the  war.  As 
one  who  has  believed  strongly  in  the  creation  of  a  Federal  Department  of  Edu- 
cation, I  think  it  unfortunate  if  the  appropriation  feature  of  the  Towner-Ster- 
ling bill  should  be  permitted  to  obscure  what  I  regard  as  the  most  important 
and  most  fundamental  aspect  of  the  subject.  I  am  interested  in  the  place  of 
education  in  the  Federal  Government,  not  only  for  education's  sake,  but  still 
more  so  for  the  sake  of  the  Nation.  I  do  not  believe  that  we  can  have  an  ade- 
quate national  government  unless  education  has  an  opportunity  to  voice  its 
sentiments  and  to  take  a  share  in  the  councils  of  the  nation  which  shall  be  at 
least  as  potent  as  the  voice  of  agriculture  or  of  industry  or  of  labor.  I  come 
from  the  same  stock  as  President  Kinley  and  I  am  adverse  by  nature  to  the 
extension  of  the  functions  of  Government.  I  think  that  President  Kinley  would 
agree  with  me  that  our  instinctive  nature  is  to  favor  what  we  mght  call  the 
"umpire  theory  of  government."  It  is  the  business  of  the  government  according 
to  this  theory  to  ensure  a  fair  field,  see  that  nobody  interferes  with  the  con- 
testants, and  then  to  leave  the  best  men  free  to  win.  That  is  the  extreme, 
individualist,  Scotch  theory  of  government  and  it  is  that  theory  of  government 
which  in  the  forming  of  our  constitution  prevented  the  United  States  from 
having  a  state  church.  Not  that  the  Scotch  were  not  interested  in  the  church, 
but  they  felt  that  the  government  should  not  restrain  the  church.  There  is 
growing  up  at  the  other  extreme  the  notion  that  we  need  a  common  agency 
for  all  social  betterment  and  that  that  agency  should  be  the  agency  of  govern- 
ment, either  state  or  nation.  I  am  sure  that  President  Kinley  and  I  shall 
never  reach  that  extreme  position  in  favor  of  a  governmental  agency  as  the 
chief  instrument  for  social  amelioration.  I  am  forced  to  accept  the  middle 
ground  in  the  present  condition  of  things  in  the  United  States  which  I  think 
has  been  well  expressed  by  the  sociologist,  Bentley,  who  says  the  essence  of  all 
government  is  the  struggle  of  interest  groups  with  each  other.  Democracy 
exists  only  where  every  interest  and  group  can  express  itself  and  secure  repre- 
sentation for  itself  in  a  fair  and  equitable  manner. 

We  see  growing  up  a  government  which  is  representative  in  a  new  sense. 
There  is  growing  up  a  government  outside  the  government.  Representation  on 
a  geographical  basis  is  being  replaced  by  this  government  of  group  interests 
represented  by  special  agents  in  Washington. 

The  interests  of  education,  the  kind  of  temper  of  our  scientific  men,  are 
elements  of  our  civilization  which  we  cannot  afford  not  to  have  represented  in  this 
conflict  of  interests  at  Washington.  Those  who  were  in  Washington  during 
the  war  felt  that  college  professors  and  men  of  scientific  mind  could  do  much  for 
governmental  affairs.    If  we  can  bring  more  of  that  scientific  mind  permanently 


76  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

into  our  national  government,  it  will  be  better  for  the  government  as  a  whole. 
I  agree  with  President  Thompson  that  there  is  some  question  about  the  per- 
manency of  the  cabinet  officer  and  as  to  his  ultimate  fame,  but  I  know  of  no 
better  method  of  giving  education  adequate  representation  as  government  is 
now  organized,  no  better  way  to  give  it  a  voice  in  the  affairs  of  the  govern- 
ment, than  by  placing  a  secretary  in  the  cabinet.  Therefore  I  strongly  favor 
the  Towner-Sterling  Bill  so  far  as  it  creates  a  department  of  education.  I  con- 
sider this  a  broad  governmental  question  to  be  settled  altogether  apart  from  the 
question  of  appropriations.  Tarde  says  that  there  are  only  two  possible  forms 
of  political  institutions:  (i)  Teleocracy  or  a  sovereignty  of  desires  and  (2) 
Ideocracy,  or  a  dominion  of  ideas.  I  believe  that  if  there  is  any  chance  of 
having  an  ideocracy  in  our  government,  it  must  come  in  the  Department  of 
Education.  If  educated  men  do  not  believe  that  ideas  can  dominate  wealth, 
no  one  else  certainly  will  attain  that  belief  and  the  very  foundation  stone  of 
a  Federal  Department  of  Education,  to  my  mind,  must  be  in  this  belief  in 
ideocracy,  the  belief  that  the  idea  is  more  potent  than  the  dollar.  For  this 
reason,  I  would  prefer  to  see  the  two  questions  divorced,  and  the  question  of 
a  Federal  Department  of  Education  debated  on  its  merits,  with  reference  to 
political  theory  in  its  widest  applications  without  the  embarrassing  desires  and 
personal  advantages  which  may  be  associated  with  the  matter  of  appropriations, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  harrassing  and  vexing  questions  of  detail  as  to  administra- 
tion such  as  have  been  presented  here  the  last  two  days. 


FEDERAL  AID  TO  EDUCATION. 
ITS  JUSTIFICATION,  DEGREE,  AND  METHOD 

By  Horace  M.  Towner,  Member  of  Congress  from  the  Eighth  Iowa  District 

AM  not  quite  sure  that  President  Kinley  expected 
me  to  discuss  the  creation  of  a  Department  of 
Education  in  connection  with  the  subject  of  Fed- 
eral Aid  to  Education.  But  as  the  subjects  are 
both  included  in  the  legislation  to  which  I  am 
committed,  and  as  they  are  so  closely  connected 
in  creation  and  application,  I  shall  venture  to  consider  them 
both  in  my  remarks. 

The  Cabinet  was  not  created  by  the  Constitution.  It  is  an 
institution  of  government  created  solely  by  legislative  enactment. 
New  executive  departments  are  created  and  new  members  of 
the  Cabinet  added  whenever  Congress  considers  it  wise  that  such 
action  should  be  taken.  The  first  three  of  the  ten  now  in  exist- 
ence were  established  in  Washington's  administration,  the  last 
one  was  created  in  1913. 

Departments  are  not  created  nor  members  of  the  Cabinet 
appointed  to  control  the  subjects  assigned  them.  If  the  general 
government  has  the  Constitutional  power  to  control  the  subject, 
such  measure  of  control  may  be  given  the  Secretary  as  Congress 
deems  advisable.  For  example,  the  general  government  is  given 
control  of  military  aifairs  and  the  Secretary  of  War  is  granted 
certain  powers  of  control.  The  general  government  is  given  con- 
trol of  postal  affairs,  and  the  Postmaster  General  is  given  large 
powers  over  such  matters.  The  Constitution  gives  no  power  to 
the  general  government  to  control  agriculture  or  labor.  Hence, 
the  Secretary  of  Agriculture  is  charged  with  the  duty  of  "pro- 
moting agriculture."  He  is  not  given  power  to  control  agricul- 
ture. The  Secretary  of  Labor  is  charged  with  the  duty  of  "fos- 
tering, promoting,  and  developing  the  welfare  of  the  wage  earners 
of  the  United  States."  He  is  given  no  power  in  any  manner  to 
control  labor.  In  like  manner,  if  a  Department  of  Education  is 
created,  its  Secretary  will  be  given  no  power  to  control  education, 
but  he  may  be  charged  with  the  duty  of  conducting  studies  and 
investigation  in  the  field  of  education,  he  may  call  educational 
conferences,  and  encourage  and  aid  the  States  in  their  educational 
work  without  exercising  any  measure  of  control. 

The  justification  for  creating  a  Department  of  Education  lies 
primarily  in  the  fact  that  education  is  of  supreme  importance 
under  our  system  of  government,  and  should  receive  the  recog- 

77 


78  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

nition  its  importance  merits.  It  has  been  a  source  of  wonder  to 
foreign  observers  of  our  institutions  that  the  United  States  has 
so  far  failed  to  give  education  such  recognition.  It  is  almost 
alone  among  the  nations  in  that  respect.  As  reported  by  the 
Bureau  of  Efficiency,  the  National  Government  expended  over 
#65,000,000  during  the  year  1920  for  educational  purposes.  The 
educational  activities  thus  carried  on  are  scattered  among  the 
numerous  bureaus,  divisions,  and  commissions  without  any  co- 
ordination and  with  numerous  duplications  of  work.  The  Bureau 
of  Education  occupying  a  subordinate  place  in  the  Department 
of  the  Interior,  and  supported  by  only  a  small  appropriation,  has 
no  control  or  even  knowledge  of  these  various  activities.  It  is 
apparent  that  in  order  to  secure  efficiency  and  economy  in  the 
work  already  assumed  of  this  character  a  directing  and  coordi- 
nating head  is  required. 

A  Department  is  needed  to  coordinate  and  integrate  the 
scattered  educational  forces  among  the  States.  It  is  proposed 
to  create  and  organize  a  National  Council  of  Education  to  con- 
sult and  advise  with  the  Secretary  of  Education  on  subjects  re- 
lating to  the  promotion  and  development  of  education  through- 
out the  nation.  This  Council  is  to  consist  of  the  chief  educa- 
tional authority  of  each  State;  25  educators,  representing  differ- 
ent interests  in  education,  and  25  eminent  persons,  not  educators, 
interested  in  education  from  the  standpoint  of  the  public.  An- 
nual conferences  are  to  be  called,  at  which  the  entire  scope  of  the 
educational  interests  of  the  nation  will  be  considered. 

It  is  manifest  that  in  order  to  carry  on  such  work  a  Secre- 
tary of  Education  is  required.  Both  in  the  councils  of  the  Cab- 
inet and  in  leadership  and  influence  with  the  educational  forces 
throughout  the  land,  such  an  educational  head  is  necessary  to 
dignify  and  unify  the  educational  work  of  the  nation.  This  does 
not  imply  nor  is  it  desired  if  it  were  possible  to  take  from  the 
States  the  control  of  their  educational  systems,  nor  does  it 
mean  the  adoption  of  a  national'  system  of  education.  It 
is  only  to  aid  and  encourage  the  States  to  greater  educational 
endeavor,  and  by  mutual  conference  and  discussion  to  bring  to 
the  States  most  backward  the  stimulus  that  will  raise  their  stand- 
ards to  the  level  of  the  more  forward  and  advanced. 

It  is  believed  that  the  creation  of  a  Department  of  Educa- 
tion, with  its  chief  a  Secretary  in  the  President's  Cabinet,  will 
express  for  the  first  time  in  our  history  the  nation's  real  interest 
in  education;  that  it  will  promote  by  research,  investigation,  and 
reports  the  practical  operation  of  our  public  school  system 
throughout  the  United  States;  that  it  will  by  leadership  and 
service  stir  the  States  and  the  people  to  a  greater  interest  in  edu- 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  79 

cational  work  and  to  a  more  comprehensive  knowledge  of  educa- 
tional needs,  and  that  it  will  mark  the  commencement  of  a  new 
era  of  educational  progress  throughout  the  whole  country. 

It  is  further  proposed  that  provision  shall  be  made  to  author- 
ize appropriations  from  the  national  treasury  to  encourage  the 
States  in  the  promotion  and  support  of  education.  In  order  to 
do  this  effectively  certain  specific  educational  needs  are  consid- 
ered as  being  the  most  important  and  pressing.  Thus  appropri- 
ations are  to  be  authorized  to  encourage  the  States  for  the  re- 
moval of  illiteracy,  for  the  Americanization  of  immigrants,  for 
the  preparation  of  teachers,  to  promote  physical  education,  and 
to  equalize  educational  opportunities.  It  is  believed  that  this 
selection  of  objects  covers  in  large  measure  the  most  pressing 
educational  needs  in  which  there  is  an  immediate  national  in- 
terest. A  State  may  accept  the  provisions  of  any  one  or  more 
of  the  respective  apportionments  by  meeting  the  prescribed  re- 
quirements and  by  providing  for  the  expenditure  from  State  or 
local  funds  of  a  sum  at  least  equally  as  large  as  the  national 
grant  for  the  particular  apportionment  authorized. 

It  is  provided  that  these  grants  from  the  National  Treasury 
are  not  dependent  upon  executive  discretion  or  favor,  but  are 
compulsory  when  the  States  meet  the  conditions  specifically 
stated  in  the  Act. 

These  requirements  are  minimum  requirements,  and  there 
can  be  no  reasonable  dissent  as  to  their  necessity  and  fairness. 
The  National  Government  cannot  make  a  grant  without  stating 
the  purpose  for  which  the  grant  is  made,  and  in  making  a  con- 
tingent grant  it  must  state  specifically  the  conditions  necessary 
to  be  met  in  order  to  secure  the  grant.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
State  is  entitled  to  know  just  what  the  requirements  necessary  to 
receive  its  part  of  the  apportionment  are,  so  that  it  can  be  as- 
sured that  if  it  meets  those  requirements,  and  those  only,  it  will 
not  have  to  appeal  for  executive  favor  in  order  to  receive  its  grant, 
and  will  not  be  required  to  surrender  control  of  its  educational 
system  to  a  centralized  authority. 

I  presume  these  propositions  are  familiar  to  you.  I  pre- 
sume, also,  that  most  of  you  are  familiar  with  the  arguments 
that  have  been  advanced  in  its  favor.  Let  us  consider  briefly 
some  of  the  objections  that  are  urged  against  this  proposed  legis- 
lation. 

It  is  said  that  the  legislation  is  unnecessary.  This  objec- 
tion is  urged  both  against  the  creation  of  a  Department  of  Edu- 
cation, and  against  the  proposal  to  aid  the  States  by  subventions 
from  the  National  Treasury.  There  is  always  reluctance  about 
creating   a   new  department.     Originally  there  were   but  three, 


80  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

State,  Treasury,  and  War.  An  advisory  attorney  was  selected, 
and  afterward  he  became  a  member  of  the  Cabinet.  Then  came 
at  intervals,  Navy,  Post  Office,  Interior,  Agriculture,  Commerce 
and  Labor,  and  then  separately,  Labor.  Now  we  have  ten  de- 
partments, and  our  Cabinet  is  one  of  the  smallest  among  the 
nations.  The  purpose  of  the  creation  of  all  these  executive  de- 
partments was  to  give  recognition  to  and  secure  a  more  effective 
realization  of  our  primary  and  essential  National  interests.  Be- 
cause the  National  Government  was  not  given  control  of  educa- 
tion, and  because  the  States  have  exercised  that  power  does  not 
disparage  the  fact  that  education  has  been  throughout  our  history 
a  primary,  almost  a  paramount  interest  of  the  Nation.  In  1785 
the  National  Government  made  grants  of  its  public  lands  for  the 
"maintenance  of  public  schools."  The  Ordinance  of  1787  creat- 
ing the  Northwest  Territory  provided  that  "Schools  and  the 
means  of  education  shall  be  forever  encouraged."  From  that 
time  down  to  the  present  the  National  Government  has  recog- 
nized education  as  an  important  interest  of  the  Nation,  and  has 
aided  it  with  grants  both  of  land  and  money.  If  it  has  been  and 
is  a  primary  interest  of  the  Nation,  why  should  not  full  recogni- 
tion be  given  it  by  the  National  Government?  It  certainly  is  of 
equal  importance  with  Commerce,  or  Agriculture,  or  Labor. 

It  is  asserted  by  some  objectors  that  merely  to  create  a  De- 
partment of  Education  and  select  a  Secretary  will  transfer  the 
control  of  the  schools  from  the  States  to  the  Nation;  that  in  some 
mysterious  manner  there  will  thus  be  created  an  autocracy  that 
will  reach  out  and  absorb  all  the  educational  activities  of  the 
Nation;  that  for  some  undisclosed  and  malevolent  purpose  a 
conspiracy  has  been  formed  of  the  educators  of  the  country  to 
subvert  the  Constitution  and  destroy  the  liberties  of  the  people. 
It  is  unnecessary  to  say  in  this  presence  that  there  is  no  effort 
being  made  anywhere  or  by  anybody  to  transfer  the  control  of 
the  schools  from  the  States  to  the  Nation.  On  the  contrary,  in 
most  explicit  terms  the  Secretary  is  forbidden  to  exercise  any 
control  over  the  schools  within  the  States,  and  that  power  is  ex- 
pressly reserved  to  the  States. 

The  objection  is  also  urged  that  merely  to  grant  appropria- 
tions from  the  National  Treasury  contingent  upon  conditions, 
in  and  of  itself  transfers  control  from  the  States  to  the  Nation; 
that  the  States  in  order  to  secure  the  funds  from  the  National 
Government  will  surrender  their  Constitutional  rights;  in  short, 
that  the  Nation  offers  to  buy  from  the  States  the  control  of  the 
schools  and  assume  the  power  of  directing  and  managing  the 
education  of  the  people. 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  81 

This  objection,  strange  as  it  may  appear,  is  the  argument 
most  strongly  urged  by  the  opponents  of  the  legislation  for  Na- 
tional aid.  It  must  appear  indeed  remarkable  that  such  a  purpose 
could  have  actuated  the  educators  of  the  country  in  the  forma- 
tion of  their  bill.  It  has  not  generally  been  supposed  that  the 
school  men  of  the  Nation  were  engaged  in  a  conspiracy  to  sub- 
vert the  Constitution  and  secure  control  of  the  Government.  It 
must  appear  to  every  reasonable  man  that  there  is  no  desire  nor 
can  there  be  any  purpose  on  the  part  of  the  Representatives  of 
the  Government  to  take  over  the  control  of  the  schools.  It  must 
also  be  apparent  that  the  people  of  the  States  are  not  so  stupid 
and  submissive  as  to  sell  their  right  to  control  the  education  of 
their  children  for  a  money  bribe. 

The  legislation  is  advocated  because  conditions  are  urgent 
and  demand  action,  and  because  the  States  are  in  some  cases 
unable  and  in  others  unwilling  to  meet  the  emergency  without 
help.  It  is  to  stimulate  the  States  to  greater  activity  in  the  edu- 
cation of  their  own  people;  it  is  to  aid  them  in  reducing  the  bur- 
den and  danger  because  of  the  ignorance  of  their  people  that  this 
legislation  is  urged.  The  Government  has  an  equal  interest  with 
the  States  in  the  character  of  its  citizens.  The  Government  has 
no  citizens  nor  interests  within  its  territory  outside  the  States. 
Their  people  are  its  people,  and  their  citizens  are  its  citizens.  If 
the  people  of  the  States  are  ignorant,  so  are  the  people  of  the 
Nation.  If  the  peace,  prosperity,  and  security  of  the  States  must 
depend  upon  the  intelligence  of  its  citizens,  so  is  it  with  the  Na- 
tion. With  this  community  of  interest  there  is  a  common  obliga- 
tion. So  it  is  proposed  to  aid  the  States  by  granting  them  funds 
from  the  National  Treasury,  and  in  effect  to  say  to  the  States: 
"The  National  Government  will  help  you  to  remove  this  burden 
and  danger  from  your  people,  because  your  people  are  my  peo- 
ple, and  your  interests  are  my  interests."  In  effect,  also,  the 
Government  declares  to  the  States  by  this  proposed  legislation: 
"This  aid  is  granted  you  upon  the  condition  that  you  use  it  only 
for  the  purpose  stated  in  the  grant,  and  that  you  use  it  in  your 
own  way  without  dictation  or  control  by  the  Government." 

It  may  be  again  stated  that  all  the  conditions  upon  which 
aid  is  granted  are  statutory,  and  are  specifically  stated  in  the  Act. 
These  requirements  may  be  changed  by  Congress,  but  they  can- 
not be  changed  by  the  Secretary  or  any  other  executive  officer. 
No  additional  requirements  can  be  added,  and  no  autocratic, 
bureaucratic,  or  centralized  control  imposed. 

It  should  be  further  stated  that  before  any  State  can  receive 
the  benefits  of  the  Act  such  State  must  by  legislative  enactment 
accept  it  provisions.    So  that  there  must  be  an  agreement  of  the 


82  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

representatives  of  the  people  of  the  Nation  with  the  representa- 
tives of  the  people  of  the  State  before  the  legislation  can  become 
effective.  Under  such  circumstances  it  is  not  probable,  it  is  not 
possible  that  the  State  will  surrender  its  rights,  or  that  the  Nation 
will  transcend  its  powers. 

Attention  is  called  to  the  fact  that  by  the  provisions  of  the 
bill  the  administration,  the  application,  and  distribution  of  the 
funds  within  the  State  are  exclusively  committed  to  the  State 
authorities.  I  think  I  am  justified  in  saying  that  in  no  other 
legislation  of  this  character  ever  enacted  have  the  rights  of  the 
States  been  so  carefully  guarded.  Let  me  call  your  attention 
to  this  provision  of  the  bill,  found  in  Section  13,  1-3: 

"Provided,  That  courses  of  study,  plans  and  methods  for 
carrying  out  the  purposes  and  provisions  of  this  Act  within  a 
State,  shall  be  determined  by  the  State  and  local  educational 
authorities  of  said  State,  and  this  Act  shall  not  be  construed  to 
require  uniformity  of  courses  of  study,  plans,  and  methods  in 
the  several  States  in  order  to  secure  the  benefits  herein  provided: 
and  provided  further,  That  all  the  educational  facilities  en- 
couraged by  the  provisions  of  this  Act  and  accepted  by  a  State 
shall  be  organized,  supervised,  and  administered  exclusively  by 
the  legally  constituted  State  and  local  educational  authorities  of 
said  State,  and  the  Secretary  of  Education  shall  exercise  no  au- 
thority in  reation  thereto  except  as  herein  provided  to  insure  that 
all  funds  apportioned  to  said  State  shall  be  used  for  the  purposes 
for  which  they  are  appropriated  by  Congress." 

If  any  stronger  or  more  explicit  statement  can  be  made  sav- 
ing to  the  States  their  right  to  control  their  own  schools  in  their 
own  way  and  prohibiting  any  interference  on  the  part  of  the 
General  Government,  the  friends  of  the  measure  would  be  glad 
to  accept  it. 

It  is  said  that  contributions  from  the  National  Treasury 
are  unnecessary,  for  the  States  will  meet  the  emergency  and 
provide  the  necessary  means.  If  that  were  true,  the  objection 
would  be  good.     But  is  it  true? 

Take  illiteracy,  as  an  example,  and  consider  conditions.  The 
census  of  1910  showed  that  in  the  United  States  there  were 
5,500,000  over  10  years  of  age  who  could  not  read  or  write  any 
language.  In  addition  there  were  3,500,000  who  could  not  speak, 
or  read,  or  write  English.  This  placed  us  below  the  standard  of 
most  of  the  civilized  nations  of  the  world.  But  that  was  not  the 
worst.  The  examination  of  the  draft  registrants  for  service  in 
the  late  war  showed  that  of  the  men  called  between  the  ages  of 
21  and  31,  nearly  25  per  cent  could  not  read  a  newspaper,  could 
not  write  a  letter  home,  and  could  not  read  the  posted  orders 
about  the  camps. 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  83 

The  Nation's  defense  is  thus  doubly  impaired;  first,  because 
one-fourth  of  the  sons  of  America  called  to  the  colors  are  in- 
capacitated for  efficient  service  because  of  their  ignorance;  and, 
second,  because  in  a  free  country  its  safety  is  jeopardized  when 
a  determining  portion  of  its  voters  cannot  read  the  ballots  they 
cast  and  can  only  vote  as  they  are  told. 

Consider  the  economic  loss  which  Secretary  Lane  estimates 
as  at  least  $825,000,000  each  year.  The  Director  of  the  Bureau 
of  Mines  states  that  of  the  1,000,000  men  engaged  in  mining  in 
the  United  States  620,000  are  foreigners,  and  that  of  these  460,- 
000  cannot  speak  English.  He  states  that  the  removal  of  illiter- 
acy among  the  miners  would  save  annually  1,000  lives  and 
150,000  injuries.  Investigation  has  shown  that  one-half  the  in- 
dustrial accidents  are  the  result  of  ignorance,  because  the  workers 
cannot  read  the  danger  warnings  or  understand  the  orders  given. 

It  has  been  said  that  illiteracy  is  a  Southern  problem.  The 
facts  do  not  warrant  that  conclusion.  Georgia  has  389,000  illit- 
erates, but  New  York  has  406,000.  Alabama  has  352,000,  while 
Pennsylvania  has  354,000.  Louisiana  has  352,000,  Mississippi 
290,000,  and  Texas  282,000;  but  Illinois  has  168,000,  Ohio,  124,- 
000,  and  even  Massachusetts  has  141,000. 

It  is  thought  that  illiteracy  is  a  race  problem.  But  it  is  much 
more  than  that.  There  are  over  1,000,000  more  white  illiterates 
in  the  United  States  than  illiterate  negroes. 

Is  not  this  clearly  a  National  problem?  If  the  Nation's 
safety  is  imperilled,  if  the  lives  of  its  own  citizens  are  being  lost, 
and  if  the  States  are  not  able  or  not  willing  without  help  to  re- 
move this  reproach  and  danger,  is  not  National  aid  justified 
and  imperative? 

Consider  the  condition  of  our  immigrant  population.  We 
now  have  over  15,000,000  foreign  born  people  in  the  United 
States.  More  than  5,000,000  cannot  speak,  read,  or  write  Eng- 
lish. More  than  2,000,000  cannot  read  or  write  any  language. 
Unfortunately  these  foreigners  often  group  themselves  into  alien 
settlements  or  colonies,  where  our  language  is  not  spoken,  where 
our  journals  are  not  read,  and  where  the  whole  environment  is 
alien  and  un-American.  These  masses  of  alien  ignorance  con- 
stitute a  rich  soil  for  sowing  the  seeds  of  unrest  and  revolt.  Rev- 
olutionary agitators  who  come  to  this  country  to  advocate  the 
destruction  of  our  Government  find  here  their  opportunity. 

To  make  the  immigrant  understand  America  is  the  only  way 
to  make  him  love  America.  He  cannot  love  a  country  he  does 
not  understand.  Education  is  the  first  requisite  of  Americaniza- 
tion.    Education,  first  in  our  language,  and  then  in  the  nature 


84  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

of  our  institutions  is  the  best  defense  against  the  bolshevik  and 
the  anarchist. 

This  demand  is  not  being  met.  When  great  States  like  Mas- 
sachusetts and  New  York  and  Ohio  have  actually  increased  both 
their  percentage  and  total  of  illiteracy  within  the  decade  from 
1900  to  19 10  because  of  their  failure  to  educate  their  foreign  born, 
we  realize  that  even  these  enlightened  commonwealths  need  stim- 
ulation and  aid. 

Perhaps  no  disclosure  of  the  draft  examinations  carries  more 
reproach  to  our  intelligence  than  the  fact  that  out  of  about  2,400,- 
000  young  men  examined  for  service  700,000,  or  nearly  one-third, 
were  found  disqualified  because  of  physical  disability.  Ninety 
percent  of  these  disabilities  could  have  been  prevented  by  a 
knowledge  of  the  simplest  rules  of  hygiene  and  health.  It  was 
ignorance,  gross  ignorance,  that  in  the  vast  majority  of  cases  was 
the  cause  of  their  incompetence. 

There  is  but  one  adequate  remedy  for  this  disgraceful  and 
distressing  condition, — to  put  into  all  our  schools  a  system  of 
physical  education.  Unfortunately,  this  has  not  been  done.  The 
additional  cost  deprives  thousands  of  schools  and  tens  of  thous- 
ands of  children  of  this  essential  element  of  education.  Here 
again  is  the  stimulation  and  help  of  the  Nation  needed  to  remedy 
the  existing  unfortunate  conditions. 

That  gross  inequalities  in  educational  opportunities  exist 
within  and  among  the  States  is  well  known.  In  the  South  almost 
one-half  of  the  negro  children  never  see  the  inside  of  a  school 
room.  In  the  North  there  is  hardly  a  city  that  has  adequate 
facilities  for  all  its  children.  In  some  rural  communities  and 
factory  districts  the  value  of  the  property  is  so  small  that  local 
taxation  cannot  support  the  schools.  On  an  average  the  country 
boy  has  two  months  less  school  than  the  city  boy. 

Unfortunately,  it  is  found  that  where  the  educational  needs 
are  greatest  the  schools  are  most  inadequate.  All  over  our  land 
the  poorest  schools  are  in  the  poorest  communities — just  where 
the  best  schools  are  most  needed.  To  equalize  educational  op- 
portunities is  a  task  the  Nation  is  especially  qualified  to  under- 
take. To  encourage  and  aid  the  backward  States  to  bring  their 
deficiencies  up  to  a  reasonable  measure  of  efficiency  and  service 
is  apparently  a  National  duty.  By  such  stimulation  and  coopera- 
tion we  may  be  able  to  give  every  child  in  America  the  advan- 
tage of  at  least  a  common  school  education. 

The  most  pressing  educational  problem  confronting  the  peo- 
ple of  the  United  States  at  the  present  time  is  to  obtain  compe- 
tent teachers  for  our  schools.  Thousands  of  schools  have  been 
closed  because  teachers  of  any  kind  could  not  be  secured.    Tens 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  85 

of  thousands  of  schools  are  now  being  taught  by  incompetent 
teachers.  Three  hundred  thousand  are  teaching  who  have  no 
professional  training  whatever. 

An  equally  imperative  duty  is  that  of  providing  means  for 
the  better  preparation  of  teachers.  We  need  about  700,000  teach- 
ers to  teach  our  schools,  and  this  requires  about  120,000  new 
teachers  each  year  to  keep  the  quota  full.  Our  schools  and  col- 
leges preparing  for  teaching  are  turning  out  but  24,000  each  year. 
Nearly  100,000  must  enter  the  profession  each  year  inadequately 
prepared.  This  condition  is  alarming,  and  must  be  remedied.  In 
some  way  we  must  bring  the  States  and  the  people  to  a  realization 
of  this  danger.  Unless  conditions  can  be  bettered  we  shall  have 
in  the  present  decade  a  larger  proportion  of  near-illiterates 
than  was  disclosed  by  the  war  registration.  Indifference  as  to 
the  character  of  our  schools  and  their  teachers  will  inevitably 
lead  to  a  deterioration  of  our  citizenship.  We  must  see  to  it  that 
every  school  in  the  land  is  taught  by  a  competent  teacher. 
Nothing  less  than  that  is  safe  for  either  State  or  Nation. 

If  illiteracy  is  a  National  peril,  if  ignorance  of  our  language 
and  institutions  is  a  source  of  danger,  if  unjustifiable  inequalities 
exist  in  educational  opportunities  in  our  land,  if  our  young  men 
called  to  the  service  of  their  country  are  incapacitated  because 
of  ignorance  of  the  ordinary  rules  of  health,  if  schools  are  being 
closed  for  want  of  teachers,  and  almost  one-half  are  being  taught 
by  incompetent  teachers,  then  it  can  fairly  be  claimed  that  Na- 
tional aid  for  education  is  justified  and  necessary. 

It  is  urged  as  an  objection  that  it  is  unjust  to  cajl  upon  the 
stronger  States  to  aid  the  weaker  to  educate  their  children;  that 
the  money  derived  from  general  taxation  which  would  fall 
heaviest  on  the  richer  States  should  not  be  used  to  help  the  poorer 
States;  that  each  State  should  bear  the  burden  and  responsibility 
of  educating  its  own  people. 

This  objection  was  urged  from  the  beginning  against  the 
whole  system  of  public  schools.  It  was  argued  that  parents 
should  have  the  burden  of  educating  their  own  children  and  that 
taxation  to  support  common  schools  was  unconstitutional  and 
unjust.  It  was  said  the  rich  man  was  under  no  obligation  to 
help  educate  the  children  of  the  poor.  It  was  especially  urged 
that  those  having  no  children  to  educate  must  not  be  taxed  to 
help  educate  the  children  of  others.  It  was  still  more  strenuously 
insisted  that  it  was  especially  iniquitous  to  tax  the  property  of  a 
bachelor  to  carry  on  schools  for  others'  children. 

But  all  those  objections  were  disregarded,  and  now  no  one 
claims  that  it  is  unjust  to  tax  the  rich  man  to  educate  the  poor 
man's  children,  and  the  bachelor  must  pay  his  taxes  to  support 


86  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

the  schools,  whether  he  wants  to  or  not.  It  is  recognized  that 
the  welfare  of  a  community  or  State  depends  upon  the  character 
of  its  citizens;  that  the  city  or  State  is  concerned  for  its  own 
safety  and  peace  in  the  intelligence  of  all  its  citizens,  and  that 
each  must  contribute  his  share  for  the  common  good. 

So  with  the  Nation.  We  have  seen  how  its  safety  may  be 
jeopardized  because  of  the  illiteracy  and  physical  incapacity  of 
so  many  of  its  young  men.  We  have  seen  how  in  a  free  Govern- 
ment its  security  and  prosperity  depend  on  the  intelligence  of  its 
entire  electorate.  Neither  illiterates  nor  alien  malcontents  can 
be  confined  to  any  one  State.  And  so  it  is  a  National  problem 
as  well  as  a  State  and  local  problem.  Manifestly,  it  needs  the 
cooperation  of  all  these  to  find  and  supply  the  remedy. 

The  cost  to  the  Government  is  urged  as  an  objection  to  the 
legislation.  To  place  this  additional  burden  on  the  Government 
at  this  time  of  extraordinary  expenditures  would  be  unwise,  it  is 
said.  Our  people  already  groaning  under  the  weight  of  Federal 
taxes  will  not  approve  this  addition  to  the  load,  it  is  argued. 
Granting  the  full  weight  of  this  objection,  it  must  be  admitted 
that  the  Nation  must  make  choice  as  to  its  expenditures.  Wise 
action  depends  on  selecting  those  objects  for  National  appropri- 
ations which  are  most  needed  and  most  important.  There  is 
nothing  in  our  scheme  of  Government  more  important  than  the 
education  of  the  people.  Whatever  else  may  be  left  out,  educa- 
tion cannot  safely  be  excluded.  And  this  may  be  said  to  the 
credit  of  our  people,  the  one  thing  that  justifies  a  tax  in  their 
judgment  is  that  which  strengthens  and  supports  our  public 
schools.  There  are  many  millions  annually  appropriated  which 
in  their  opinion  have  much  less  justification  than  the  appropria- 
tions authorized  by  this  bill.  We  might  cut  off  a  hundred  mil- 
lion from  either  the  Army  or  the  Navy  bills  with  less  danger  and 
more  profit  than  to  omit  this  appropriation.  We  gave  seventy- 
five  millions  the  other  day  to  the  States  for  good  roads.  Are 
good  roads  of  more  importance  than  good  schools?  We  are  still 
spending  millions  to  remove  rocks  from  our  harbors  and  snags 
from  our  rivers;  to  remove  hog-cholera  in  Iowa,  and  cattle-ticks 
in  Texas;  to  remove  boll-weevil  in  Alabama,  and  wheat-rust  in 
North  Dakota, — are  we  justified  in  refusing  to  spend  anything 
to  remove  illiteracy  from  our  own  American  citizens?  It  is 
not  that  the  things  mentioned  are  not  worthy  of  consideration,  but 
certainly  they  are  not  more  worthy  of  consideration  than  is  the 
education  of  our  children.  Those  things  are  after  all  but  economic 
ills,  while  ignorance  imperils  the  safety  and  endangers  the  per- 
petuity of  the  Nation  itself. 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  87 

There  are  some  outstanding  facts  regarding  the  relations  of 
the  Nation  and  the  States  toward  education  which  it  is  wise  to 
recognize.  There  has  never  been  proposed  in  Congress  any  legis- 
lation which  even  suggested  that  the  Nation  should  take  from  the 
States  the  control  of  education.  No  one  has  ever  advocated  it, 
no  one  now  proposes  it,  no  one  in  or  out  of  Congress  desires  it. 
The  proposition  has  no  support  anywhere  by  anyone. 

There  is  no  legal  authority  for  such  legislation  if  anyone  did 
propose  it.  If  a  bill  carrying  such  a  proposal  were  introduced,  it 
would  immediately  be  recognized  as  without  Constitutional  war- 
rant, and  would  never  even  reach  the  calendar  of  either  Senate 
or  House. 

To  claim  that  anyone,  sponsor  or  supporter  of  the  pending 
educational  bill,  desires  or  expects  National  control  of  education 
to  follow  the  enactment  of  the  legislation  under  consideration  is 
without  the  slightest  sanction.  To  state  that  the  emphatic  and 
repeated  negations  expressed  in  the  strongest  language  that  can 
be  used  which  are  incorporated  in  the  very  terms  of  the  proposed 
law  mean  nothing  and  will  not  be  effective,  is  to  say  that  no  law 
can  be  made  effective  by  its  terms. 

But  while  Congress  has  no  desire  nor  purpose  nor  Constitu- 
tional power  to  take  from  the  States  the  control  of  education, 
the  General  Government  has  the  right  to  aid  and  encourage  the 
States  in  the  education  of  their  and  its  citizens,  and  this  right 
it  has  exercised  repeatedly  from  the  beginning  of  our  history  to 
the  passage  of  the  last  Appropriation  Act.  It  granted  sections  of 
the  public  lands  to  the  States  for  schools.  It  granted  townships 
of  land  for  the  creation  and  support  of  universities.  Lands  were 
given  as  long  as  they  lasted,  and  then  money  was  given.  Congress 
gives  annually  over  two  and  a  half  million  dollars  from  the  Na- 
tional Treasury  for  the  "support  and  further  endowment  of  col- 
leges of  agriculture  and  mechanic  arts."  Every  year  we  give  tens 
of  millions  of  dollars  from  the  National  Treasury  in  support  of 
almost  every  form  of  education.  Why  is  it  that  these  grants  are 
not  opposed?  Why  is  it  that  where  education  is  so  much  needed, 
at  the  very  bottom  of  our  political  and  social  structure,  where  it 
enters  into  the  very  texture  of  the  fabric  of  our  American  citi- 
zenship— in  form  about  which  there  is  no  controversy  and  in 
substance  the  acknowledged  essential — why  is  it  that  when  it  is 
proposed  to  strengthen  our  common  school  system  the  proposi- 
tion is  condemned  and  opposed? 

It  must  be  that  such  opposition  is  based  upon  a  misconcep- 
tion of  the  proposed  legislation.  To  think  otherwise  would  be 
to  believe  that  there  were  in  our  country  those  who  really  desired 


88  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

the  destruction  of  our  common  school  system.     Such  a  belief  no 
loyal  American  would  desire  to  entertain. 

You  who  listen  to  me  today  are  educators  or  are  greatly 
interested  in  the  cause  of  education  in  the  United  States.  This 
is  primarily  your  cause.  It  is  your  particular  responsibility.  It 
is  characteristic  of  the  American  people  to  be  intensely  interested 
and  enthusiastic  in  the  formation  and  establishment  of  a  partic- 
ular public  service,  and  then  when  they  have  succeeded  and  have 
placed  it  in  what  they  believe  competent  hands, — to  go  off  and 
forget  about  it.  In  a  degree  that  has  been  true  of  our  common 
school  system.  We  have  been  so  absorbed  in  building  cities, 
making  railways,  plowing  prairies,  redeeming  wildernesses  and 
subduing  a  continent  that  we  have  had  little  time  to  give  to  the 
humdrum  work  of  the  district  school.  Lately,  all  our  minds  and 
hearts,  all  our  energy  and  activities  have  been  given  to  save  our 
country  and  the  world  from  a  savage  onslaught  of  outlaw  nations. 
And  as  a  consequence  we  have  allowed  twenty-five  out  of  every 
one  hundred  of  our  sons  and  daughters  to  sink  into  deplorable 
depths  of  illiteracy  and  ignorance.  We  must  rescue  them.  WTe 
must  see  that  their  successors  shall  not  suffer  like  neglect  and 
misfortune.  We  are  compelled  to  realize  that  an  intolerable  con- 
dition exists  which  must  not  be  allowed  longer  to  continue.  This 
calls  for  each  of  us  to  bear  a  part  in  the  work  set  before  us.  By 
the  memory  of  those  who  throughout  all  the  years  of  our  Na- 
tional life  have  given  so  much  of  thought  and  service  to  the  up- 
building of  the  Republic;  by  the  memory  of  the  thousands  who 
by  the  sacrifice  of  life  itself  have  rescued  the  Nation  from  dis- 
honor and  destruction,  we  are  called  to  meet  and  well  fulfill  the 
responsibilities  which  now  are  ours. 


CONSTITUTIONAL  AND  POLITICAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF 
FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  ON  EDUCATION 

By  Thomas  Sterling,  United  States  Senator  from  South  Dakota 

N  SPEAKING  to  you  on  the  subject  assigned,  name- 
ly,   "Constitutional    and    Political    Significance    of 
Federal  Legislation  on  Education,"  I  should  per- 
haps say  a  word  for  the  purpose  of  clarifying  the 
theme  itself.    By  the  "Constitutional  Significance," 
I  understand  is  meant  the  bearing,  if  any,  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  United  States  may  have  in  the  way  of  either  per- 
mitting or  preventing  any  legislation  by  Congress  for  the  purpose 
of  controlling  or  promoting  education. 

By  "Political  Significance,"  I  understand  is  meant  the  bear- 
ing such  legislation  may  have  on  the  relations  of  the  individual 
citizen  to  the  State  or  the  Federal  Government,  including  its 
bearing  on  the  social  and  political  life  and  ideals  of  the  people. 
While  in  our  day  education  is  an  all-absorbing  and  practical 
source  of  effort  and  desire,  we  search  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States  in  vain  for  the  word  "education."  It  is,  in  this 
respect,  a  barren  field.  So  far  as  we  know,  no  proposal  in  the 
interests  of  education  was  brought  before  the  convention  of  1787 
save  one,  by  James  Madison,  which  would  have  given  Congress 
the  power: 

"To  establish  seminaries  for  the  promotion  of  the 
arts  and  sciences. 

"To  establish  public  institutions,  rewards   and  im- 
munities  for  the  promotion   of   agriculture,   commerce, 
trade  and  manufacture." 
It  appears  that  the  proposal  was  not  discussed  by  the  convention 
except  that  one  member  expressed  the  view  that  it  was  not  neces- 
sary to  grant  such  power  to  Congress,  as  "the  exclusive  power  at 
the  seat  of  Government  will  reach  the  object." 

We  read  the  specifically  enumerated  powers  of  Congress  con- 
tained in  Section  8  of  Article  I  of  the  Constitution,  beginning 
with  the  power  "to  lay  and  collect  taxes,  duties,  imposts  and  ex- 
cises, etc.,"  and  ending  with  the  power  "to  make  all  laws  which 
shall  be  necessary  and  proper  for  carrying  into  execution  the  fore- 
going powers,  etc.,"  and  find  no  authority,  expressed  or  to  be 
implied,  in  this  grant  of  powers  for  Congressional  action  in  direct- 
ing, controlling  or  promoting  the  education  of  the  people.  The 
nearest  approach  to  the  subject  is  found  in  that  clause  which  con- 
fers upon  Congress  the  power: 

89 


9o  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

"To  promote  the  progress  of  science  and  useful  arts 
by  securing  for  limited  times  to  authors  and  inventors 
the  exclusive  right  to  their  respective  writings  and  dis- 
coveries."— 
the  Constitutional  warrant,  of  course,  for  our  copyright  and  patent 
laws,  but  never  thought  of  by  the  most  liberal  constructionists 
as  affording  ground  for  Federal  interest  in  or  control  of  education. 
To  come  to  the  point,  the  powers  of  Congress  under  the  Con- 
stitution are  delegated  powers.    By  the  terms  of  Article  X, 
"The  powers  not  delegated  to  the  United  States  by 
the  Constitution,  nor  prohibited  by  it  to  the  States,  are 
reserved  to  the  States  respectively,  or  to  the  people." 
The  power  to  direct  or  control  education  is  not  delegated  to  the 
United  States;  that  is,  not  delegated  to  the  Federal  Government 
acting    through    either    the    Legislative    or    Executive    branches 
thereof.    It  is  not  a  power  prohibited  to  the  States,  and  is  there- 
fore a  power  reserved  to  the  States  or  to  the  people. 

The  various  grants  of  power  are  in  the  most  concise  terms 
possible.  In  many  cases  they  have  been  apparently  extended  by 
judicial  interpretation,  or  by  what  the  critics  would  more  harshly 
term  "judicial  legislation."  The  framers  of  the  interstate  com- 
merce clause  of  the  Constitution,  giving  Congress  the  power  to 
regulate  commerce  with  foreign  nations  and  among  the  several 
States,  could  hardly  have  dreamed  of  those  new  conditions  and 
that  more  complex  society  which  have  invited  or  demanded  the 
frequent  application  of  the  right  of  Congress  to  regulate  com- 
merce among  the  several  States  of  the  Union.  It  is  in  this  sense 
rather  than  by  judicial  legislation  that  the  powers  of  Congress 
seem  to  have  been  extended. 

Likewise,  the  power  to  establish  post  offices  and  post  roads 
is  couched  in  so  many  words,  but  as  a  result  we  have  the  postal 
system  which  is  the  marvel  of  the  world.  Moreover,  rural  and 
city  free  delivery;  the  parcels  post;  the  exclusion  from  the 
mails  of  certain  matter  regarded  as  dangerous  to  the  morals, 
health  and  peace  of  society;  the  appropriation  of  more  than  three 
hundred  millions  of  dollars  of  Federal  money  since  19 16  to  aid 
the  States  in  the  construction  of  roads, — have  followed  as  a  con- 
sequence of  this  apparently  limited  grant  of  power. 

Of  course,  with  each  new  exercise  or  application  of  the  power 
has  come  the  cry  of  unconstitutionality,  of  centralization,  of  pa- 
ternalism; but,  recognizing  new  conditions  and  new  needs,  the 
highest  judicial  tribunal  has  for  the  most  part  sustained  the  legis- 
lation enacted  in  pursuance  thereof,  and  the  people  have  come  to 
realize  that  there  has  been  no  usurpation  and  no  infringement 
upon  the  principles  or  spirit  of  true  Democracy. 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  91 

But,  in  the  cases  I  have  cited,  there  is  the  ultimate  power 
found  in  the  language  of  the  Constitution.  In  the  matter  of  ed- 
ucation, there  is  no  such  obvious  starting  point.  Is  there  any- 
thing at  all  on  which  to  build? 

There  is  little  question  but  that  the  desire  for  the  general 
welfare  has  been  the  animating  cause  for  much  of  the  legislation 
assumed  to  be  in  pursuance  of  a  power  under  the  Constitution, 
and  that  it  has  been  a  factor  also  in  judicial  interpretation. 

To  what  extent  may  the  general  welfare  be  the  ground  of 
Congressional  action,  where  no  express  power  whatever  concern- 
ing the  particular  subject  is  conferred  upon  Congress? 

The  general  welfare  is  twice  mentioned  in  the  Constitution: 
First,  in  the  preamble,  where  to  "promote  the  general  welfare" 
is  named  as  one  of  the  objects  for  which  the  Constitution  is  or- 
dained and  established;  and  secondly,  in  Section  8  of  Article  I 
where,  among  objects  for  which  Congress  may  collect  taxes  is  the 
one  to  "provide  for  the  general  welfare  of  the  United  States." 

To  what  extent  may  Federal  legislation,  relating  to  educa- 
tion, be  built  on  these  two? 

As  a  background  to  some  conclusions  reached,  let  it  be  ob- 
served that  the  omissions  of  the  Constitution  do  not  reflect  the 
attitude  of  the  fathers  of  the  Republic  in  regard  to  education, 
although,  considering  the  fact  that  so  many  of  these  were  edu- 
cated men  with  their  traditional  belief  in  the  diffusion  of  educa- 
tion among  the  people,  and  that  it  must  be  counted  on  as  the 
very  cornerstone  of  free  Government,  the  wonder  to  the  super- 
ficial observer  at  least  is  that  their  beliefs  did  not  find  some  ex- 
pression in  the  fundamental  law. 

But  now,  in  the  light  of  our  wonderful  history,  with  our  bet- 
ter understanding  of  all  the  forces  and  factors  that  have  entered 
into  the  problem,  I  am  convinced  that  if  the  founders  of  the  Con- 
stitution did  not  "build  more  wisely  than  they  knew,"  they 
builded  more  wisely  than  many  who  came  after  them  have  known. 
For  it  was  a  new  and,  as  they  hoped,  permanent  Federal  Govern- 
ment they  were  constructing,  and  that  too,  out  of  States  most 
sensitive  as  to  their  prerogatives.  Few  indeed  were  the  interests 
which  they  were  willing  to  yield  to  the  control  of  a  central  power, 
and  thus,  education,  like  a  hundred  other  interests,  was  left  to 
the  initiative  and  control  of  the  local  community  or  of  the  State. 

I  think  for  those  what  we  might  term  formative  days,  it  was 
better  so.  Out  of  the  knowledge  of  the  people  of  the  several 
States  of  their  own  particular  conditions  and  needs;  out  of  State 
pride  and  a  spirit  of  emulation;  and  out  of  the  dependence  of  the 
State  upon  its  own  educational  resources,  came  that  State  initia- 
tive development  and  strength,  which  contributed  more  to  the 


92  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

strength  of  the  whole  than  if  from  the  beginning  there  had  been 
reliance  on  the  central  Government  for  controlling  and  directing 
aid  in  the  maintenance  of  their  several  school  systems. 

Back  of  it  all,  however,  was  the  American  spirit  in  education. 
It  had  been  manifested  in  many  ways:  by  the  admonitions  of 
individual  leaders;  by  the  action  of  legislative  and  governing 
bodies;  by  the  quick  response  of  the  people  to  every  proposition 
to  widen  the  field  or  raise  higher  the  standard  of  education.  Let 
me  recall  a  few  of  these: 

The  ordinance  of  the  Continental  Congress  of  1785  gave  the 
sixteenth  section  in  every  township  for  educational  purposes,  this 
out  of  lands  ceded  by  the  original  States  to  the  United  States. 

The  celebrated  ordinance  of  1787,  for  the  government  of  the 
Northwest  Territory,  contained  the  declaration: 

"Religion,  morality  and  knowledge  being  necessary 

to  good   Government   and   the   happiness   of   mankind, 

schools  and  the  means  of  education  shall  forever  be  en- 
couraged." 

From  the  year  1803  to  the  year  1846  inclusive,  twelve  States 
had  received  the  sixteenth  section  as  an  endowment  for  public 
schools,  either  out  of  the  lands  ceded  by  the  States  to  the  United 
States,  or  out  of  the  Louisiana  Purchase,  the  total  being  10,919,- 
586  acres. 

From  the  year  1850  to  the  year  1875  inclusive,  fifteen  States 
received  sections  sixteen  and  thirty-six  out  of  every  township 
belonging  to  the  public  domain,  for  common  school  purposes, 
or  a  total  of  52,869,872  acres. 

Certain  of  the  original  thirteen  States  gave  of  their  own 
State-owned  lands  for  school  purposes. 

These  munificent  endowments  of  land  for  the  purpose  of 
general  education  rest  for  their  authority  on  that  part  of  Section 
3  of  Article  IV  of  the  Constitution,  which  gives  Congress  the 
power  "to  dispose  of  and  make  all  needful  rules  and  regulations 
respecting  the  territory  or  other  property  belonging  to  the  United 
States,"  and  Congress  thus  empowered  could  not  have  more 
nearly  reflected  the  American  genius  or  have  better  served  the 
general  welfare  than  it  did  in  rendering  this  aid  to  education. 

Aside  from  the  strong  religious  motive  which  prompted  much 
of  the  early  colonial  effort  in  the  establishment  of  schools,  these 
Acts  of  Congress  harmonized  with  what  from  the  earliest  times 
in  our  history  has  been  the  general  American  ideal. 

Washington,  as  we  know,  cherished  the  idea  of  a  National 
University.  He  made  some  provision  for  it  in  his  last  will  and 
testament.     From  that  remarkable  document  I  quote  these  sig- 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  93 

nificant  words.     They  have  a  bearing  upon  the  scope  and  pur- 
pose of  present  Congressional  effort: 

"For  these  reasons  it  has  been  my  ardent  wish  to 
see  a  plan  devised  on  a  liberal  scale  which  would  have  a 
tendency  to  spread  systematic  ideas  through  all  parts 
of  this  rising  empire,  thereby  to  do  away  with  local  at- 
tachments and  State  prejudices  as  far  as  things  would  or 
indeed  ought  to  admit  from  our  National  councils." 
The  words  too  of  his  farewell  address  will  be  as  appropriate 
down  to  our  remotest  posterity  as  when  first  uttered: 

"Promote  then,   as   an   object  of   primary   importance, 
institutions  for  the  general  diffusion  of  knowledge.     In 
proportion  as  the  structure  of  Government  gives  force  to 
public  opinion,  it  is  essential  that  public  opinion  should 
be  enlightened." 
Thus,   both  the  will   and  testament,   and  the  farewell   address, 
state  in  a  broad  way  the  political  significance  of  Federal  legisla- 
tion on  education.    Local  attachments  and  State  prejudices  should 
yield  to  those  systematic  ideas  through  which  men  comprehend 
not  merely  local  or  special  interests  and  institutions,  but  the  na- 
tional welfare,  and  it  goes  without  saying  that  in  the  last  analysis 
it  is  public  opinion  in  this  country  that  governs,  and  in  order  to 
govern  aright,  it  must  be  an  enlightened  public  opinion. 

Now  we  come  to  a  new  era  and  a  new  form  of  Government 
grant.  It  is  not  one  in  aid  of  the  common  schools  or  of  educa- 
tion generally,  but  for  institutions  of  a  new  type  where,  in  the 
language  of  the  grant: 

"The    leading    object  shall  be,  without  excluding  other 
scientific    and   classical    studies    and   including   military 
tactics,  to  teach  such  branches  of  learning  as  are  related 
to  agriculture  and  the  mechanic  arts,  in  such  manner  as 
the  Legislatures  of  the  several  States  shall  prescribe,  in 
order  to  promote  the  liberal  and  practical  education  of 
the  industrial  classes  in  the  several  pursuits   and  pro- 
fessions of  life." 
The  Morrill  Act  of   1862  was   approved  by  President  Lincoln 
after  it  had  been  vetoed  by  President  Buchanan  on  the  grounds 
that  it  was  both  inexpedient  and  unconstitutional.    I  do  not  think 
the    constitutionality    of    that    Act    has    ever    been    questioned 
in  any  judicial  proceeding.     It  has  been  characterized  as, 
"Probably    the    most    important    single    specific    enact- 
ment ever  made  in  the  interest  of  education.     *     *    * 
It  expresses  the  final  emancipation  from  formed  tradi- 
tional and  aristocratic  ideas." 
It  recognizes  the  democracy  of  education. 


94  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

This  great  State  of  Illinois  was  one  of  the  first  beneficiaries 
of  the  Morrill  Act,  and  this,  one  of  the  most  prosperous  of  our 
State  Universities,  was  established  as  the  "Illinois  Industrial  Uni- 
versity," by  aid  of  the  land  scrip  which  the  Act  authorized.  It 
has  been  said  that  you  have  dropped  the  "Industrial,"  but  from 
all  accounts  you  retain  the  industry. 

But  this  was  only  a  beginning.  It  is  followed  by  the  Hatch 
Act  of  1887,  which  gives  money,  $15,000  a  year,  the  proceeds  of 
the  sale  of  public  lands,  but  not  lands,  to  each  State  for  an  Agri- 
cultural and  Experiment  Station.  This  amount  is  doubled  by  the 
Adams  Act  of  1906. 

The  second  Morrill  Act,  that  of  1880,  gives  as  a  further  en- 
dowment to  the  Agricultural  Colleges  $15,000  a  year  to  be  in- 
creased by  $1000  a  year  until  a  total  of  #25,000  is  reached. 

And  now  comes  the  recognition  of  a  new  principle.  It  is 
found  in  the  third  Morrill  Act.  Senator  Morrill  foresaw  the 
day  when,  with  the  decrease  in  the  available  public  lands,  there 
must  necessarily  be  a  decrease  in  the  funds  to  be  derived  from 
the  sale  for  apportionment  among  the  several  States,  and  so  he 
provided  that  any  deficiency  arising  from  such  sales  should  be 
made  good  from  any  funds  in  the  National  Treasury  not  other- 
wise appropriated. 

We  have  crossed  the  line;  we  have  set  the  precedent.  If  it 
were  ever  doubted  whether  the  words  "or  other  property,"  in 
that  paragraph  of  Article  IV  of  the  Constitution  which  gives  to 
Congress  "the  power  to  make  all  needful  rules  and  regulations 
respecting  the  territory  'or  other  property'  of  the  United  States," 
could  be  construed  to  include  money,  the  doubt  was  in  effect 
removed  by  the  third  Morrill  Act.  We  did  it !  Not  to  my  knowl- 
edge has  the  constitutionality  of  this  Act  ever  been  questioned 
in  any  judicial  proceeding. 

The  enactment  successively  of  the  Agricultural  Extension 
Act  of  1914,  the  Vocational  Education  Act  of  1917,  the  Maternity 
Act  of  192 1 — all  educational,  all  now  acquiesced  in,  and  as  I  be- 
lieve, all  rejoiced  in — have  given  such  strong  legislative  construc- 
tion as  to  what  Congress  may  do  in  the  laying  of  taxes  and  the 
granting  of  money  for  the  public  welfare,  that  there  is  now  no 
danger  that  the  power  will  ever'  again  be  called  in  question. 

But  there  is  one  more  step.  It  must  be  taken  if  we  keep 
pace  with  the  growing  American  spirit  in  education.  From  the 
political  standpoint  it  is  of  the  utmost  significance.  Professor 
Bryce,  in  his  "American  Commonwealth,"  third  edition,  1895, 
after  speaking  of  the  Americans  as  an  educated  people  compared 
with  the  whole  mass  of  the  population  in  any  European  country, 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  95 

except    Switzerland,    parts    of   Germany,    Norway,    Iceland    and 
Scotland,  says  parenthetically: 

"I  speak   of   course   of   the    native   Americans,    exclud- 
ing Negroes  and  recent  immigrants." 
and  then  he  goes  on  further  to  say: 

"The    instruction    received     in     the    common    schools 
and  from  the  newspapers,  and  supposed  to  be  developed 
by  the  practice  of  primaries   and  conventions,  while  it 
makes  the  voter  deem  himself  capable  of  governing,  does 
not  fit  him  to  weigh  the  real  merits  of  his  statesmen,  to 
discern  the  true  grounds  on  which  questions  ought  to  be 
decided,  to  note  the  drift  of  events  and  discover  the  di- 
rection in  which  parties  are  being  carried." 
Taking  the  two  passages  together  with  what  he  says  by  way 
of  parenthesis,  in  regard  to  the  inclusion  of  native  Americans  and 
the  exclusion  of  'recent  immigrants',  from  his  estimate,  we  can 
readily  discover  our   new  need  for  legislation   that  will   insure 
further  aid  and  encouragement  out  of  the  National  resources. 

If  when  Viscount  Bryce  wrote  these  passages,  the  recent  'im- 
migrant element'  would  have  lowered  the  general  high  standard 
of  American  literacy,  by  how  much  more  would  it  have  done  so  a 
quarter  of  a  century  later,  considering  the  swarms  that  have  come 
to  our  shores  within  that  period  and  the  parts  of  Europe  from 
which  they  have  come. 

A  brief  survey  suggests  these  inquiries: 
Is  there  need  that  these  numerous  alien  elements,  representing 
every  variety  of  political,  economic  or  social  creed,  or  without  any 
creed  at  all,  should  be  quickly  assimilated  and  brought  into  har- 
mony with  our  ideals  of  free  Government? 

Visit  Ellis  Island,  the  great  immigrant  port  of  entry  for  the 
United  States,  or  the  great  industries — steel,  or  cotton,  or  coal — 
or  the  Little  Greece,  or  Italy,  or  Poland,  or  Russia,  or  Roumania, 
or  the  Big  Ghetto  as  you  will  find  them  in  the  big  cities  of  our 
country,  and  tell  me  how  long  you  think  it  will  take,  and  by  what 
available  processes  or  facilities,  the  task  will  be  accomplished? 
Does  this  present  a  National  problem?  Is  there  need  that  the 
general  Government  aid  in  encouraging  the  States  in  extending 
the  field  and  increasing  their  educational  facilities? 

Let  the  United  States  army  and  the  selective  service  records 
made  during  the  late  war,  with  their  astonishing  if  not  alarming 
story  of  illiteracy  and  physical  unfitness  answer  the  question. 

Would  you  know  to  what  classes  and  to  what  degree  of 
ignorance  and  illiteracy  the  men  who  advocate  the  overthrow  of 
Government  or  the  accomplishment  of  industrial  revolution  by 
force  and  violence,  make  their  most  successful  appeal?    The  rec- 


96  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

ords  of  the  courts,  State  and  Federal,  will  tell  part  of  the  story. 
The  Immigration  Bureau  at  Washington,  and  the  Bureau  of  Inves- 
tigation of  the  Department  of  Justice,  can  add  to  the  informa- 
tion; but  those  to  whom  such  appeal  is  made  are  numbered  by 
the  million. 

Can  the  nation  ignore  this  menace  to  its  peace  and  good 
order  by  failure  to  do  its  part  in  providing  means  of  education 
and  Americanization? 

Again,  is  it  not  a  matter  of  National  concern  that  the  op- 
portunities, especially  for  primary  and  rural  school  education, 
should  be  increased  and  equalized  so  that  the  children  of  America, 
whether  they  live  in  Massachusetts  or  in  Texas,  in  densely  or 
sparsely  settled  communities,  shall  have  equal  chances  to  obtain 
a  common-school  education  and  learn  the  fundamentals  of  good 
citizenship? 

These  are  all  National  problems,  thrust  upon  us  as  the  nat- 
ural and  logical  result  of  our  National  policies  and  of  our  growth 
from  the  simpler  needs  which  the  community  or  the  State  could 
perhaps  at  one  time  supply,  to  a  nation-wide  and  complex  social 
and  political  condition.  These  problems  must  have  National 
sympathy  and  cooperation  for  their  proper  solution. 

Let  it  be  remembered  that  all  these  classes  which  I  have 
just  mentioned,  un-American  in  spirit  and  sympathy  as  many  of 
them  are,  are  yet  citizens  or  potential  citizens,  not  of  the  State 
alone  in  which  they  reside,  but  of  the  United  States.  They  can- 
not be  Americanized  out  of  hand  over  night;  Americanization 
involves  education,  and  that  takes  time,  skill  and  fit  instrumen- 
talities. Let  us  not  forget  that  the  citizenship  of  every  man, 
woman  and  child,  if  they  have  citizenship  at  all,  is  a  dual  citizen- 
ship, one  a  citizenship  of  the  State,  one  of  the  Nation,  and  each  is 
the  source  of  its  peculiar  rights  and  obligations. 

It  is  no  less  imperative  that  the  citizen  respond  to  the  call 
to  perform  his  national  duty  than  it  is  that  he  perform  his  duty 
to  the  State.  More  and  more  and  sometimes  in  spite  of  ourselves 
do  we  recognize  the  all  pervasiveness  of  national  interest  and  poli- 
cies, and  more  and  more  do  we  share  in  the  national  consciousness. 
The  Nation  then  is  interested  in  the  moral,  educational,  and  polit- 
ical equipment  of  its  citizenship.  To  refer  again  to  the  language 
of  Mr.  Bryce:  the  Nation  even  more  than  the  State  is  interested 
in  knowing  that  the  voter  is  "fit  to  weigh  the  real  merits  of  state- 
men,  to  discern  the  true  grounds  on  which  questions  ought  to  be 
decided,  to  note  the  drift  of  events  and  discover  the  direction  in 
which  parties  are  being  carried." 

So,  as  it  seems  to  me  viewed  from  the  national  standpoint 
the   political   significance   of   federal   aid   in   education    can    no 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  97 

longer  be  open  to  conjecture.  Further,  that  the  aid  thus  far 
given  in  lands  or  in  money  has  resulted  in  promotion  of  the  gen- 
eral welfare  there  can  be  little  doubt.  But  there  are  present  day 
exigencies  not  within  the  scope  of  existing  legislation,  to  aid  in 
meeting  which  is  in  my  judgment  the  imperative  duty  of  the 
general  government.  They  cannot  be  met  by  a  submerged  and 
unrelated  bureau  in  the  Department  of  the  Interior,  empowered 
to  gather  and  distribute  statistical  information;  nor  can  they  be 
adequately  met  by  federal  contributions  only  for  specific  objects 
to  be  matched  by  equal  contributions  on  the  part  of  the  states 
accepting  them.  The  vital  importance  of  the  subject,  its  intimate 
relation  to  the  well  being  and  safety  of  the  people — and  this  is  the 
highest  law — as  well  as  the  dignity  of  the  subject,  all  combine 
to  urge  as  the  next  great  step  the  creation  of  a  Department  of 
Education,  with  its  secretary  a  member  of  the  president's  cabinet, 
whose  proper  function  it  shall  be  not  alone  to  administer  funds 
apportioned  to  the  states,  important  though  this  may  be,  but 
through  investigation  and  research  to  cover  the  whole  field  of  our 
educational  resources  and  needs;  and  which  without  dictation, 
without  ignoring  state  plans  or  encroaching  upon  the  freedom  of 
state  initiative  shall  from  its  higher  vantage  ground  encourage, 
stimulate,  and  lead  in  every  constitutional  cooperative  educa- 
tional enterprise  that  will  enhance  the  general  welfare. 


DISCUSSION 

Discussion  of  the  papers  read  at  the  afternoon  session  of  the  con- 
ference was  had  as  follows: 

Charler  H.  Judd,  Director,  School  of  Education,  University  of  Chicago 
Ladies  and  Gentlemen:  I  want  to  express  my  personal  appreciation  of  the 
step  taken  by  the  University  of  Illinois  in  providing  opportunity  for  this  dis- 
cussion. So  far  as  I  know,  it  is  the  first  discussion  that  has  been  provided  for 
on  this  and  related  measures;  although  we  have  had  this  bill  and  its  ancestors 
before  us  for  about  three  years.  If  we  could  have  a  full  discussion  of  the  type 
which  has  been  carried  on  here  for  two  days,  I  think  it  would  be  possible  to 
build  a  platform  on  which  we  all  could  stand  with  equal  enthusiasm.  I  am 
sure  that  this  conference  has  made  it  certain  that  we  ought  to  unite  in  insisting 
that  radical  amendments  to  the  present  bills  be  made  before  the  measure  is  put  in 
final  form  and  proposed  to  Congress. 

I  am  also  gratified  to  know  that  Judge  Towner  had  made  a  statement  that 
the  two  parts  of  this  bill  have  been  separated  from  each  other  and  that  they 
are  to  be  considered  separately.  We  can  now  go  along  with  the  first  part  of 
the  bill  without  discussing  the  second  part.  I,  for  one,  think  I  am  willing  to 
go  further  than  Judge  Towner.  I  have  such  confidence  in  the  new  secretary 
that  I  would  leave  the  problem  of  federal  subsidies  for  him  to  settle  after  he  is 
created.  It  seems  clear  that  it  is  inopportune  to  proceed  with  the  discussion 
of  legislative  measures  that  will  turn  the  new  department  into  a  mere  auditing 
office,  when  we  are  told  that  the  two  parts  of  the  bill  have  been  separated.  Why 
not  construct  a  strong  department  and  ask  it  to  recommend  after  investigation 
what  ought  to  be  done  about  subsidies? 

We  have  seen  this  bill  amended  two  or  three  times.  In  the  first  place,  the 
bill  was  adopted  by  the  National  Education  Association  in  191 8.  That  bill 
needed  radical  revision  and  some  of  us  said  so.  We  were  told  to  keep  quiet  in 
the  hope  that  Congress  would  act  quickly.  We  did  until  the  fourth  of  March, 
1919.  When  Congress  showed  no  disposition  to  act  quickly  some  of  us  ven- 
tured to  voice  our  objections  to  the  provisions  of  the  first  bill.  That  bill  con- 
tained exactly  the  provisions  of  the  Smith-Hughes  law  with  regard  to  federal 
control  of  funds  given  to  the  states.  It  gave  control  to  the  Federal  Department 
of  Education  on  exactly  the  same  terms  that  control  was  given  to  the  Federal 
Board  for  vocational  education.  For  a  period  of  nine  months  that  was  the 
form  of  the  bill.  During  these  nine  months  there  was  no  public  discussion  of 
the  bill  but  a  good  deal  of  personal  discussion  carried  on  and  such  objection 
was  found  among  state  officials  to  the  control  features  of  the  bill  that  by  the 
time  the  bill  turned  up  in  the  next  Congress  it  had  to  be  changed  to  secure 
general  support.  It  was  changed  in  such  a  manner  as  to  give  it  exactly  the 
opposite  effect.  No  public  discussion,  mark  you,  had  preceded  this  change.  It 
seems  to  me  that  it  is  fair  to  infer  that  the  framers  of  this  bill  were  without 
any  real  policy  in  the  matter.  They  were  ready  to  reverse  themselves  on  car- 
dinal issues  to  secure  support.  It  is  my  judgment  that  we  have  a  right  to  ask 
for  more  insight  on  the  part  of  those  who  frame  our  bills. 

We  are  asked  now  to  consider  only  the  first  part  of  the  bill.  Many  of  us 
have  felt  all  along  that  there  is  at  least  one  fundamental  objection  to  the  first 
part  of  the  bill.  This  objection  was  presented  to  the  commission  that  formulated 
the  bill  and  to  everybody  who  has  had  charge  of  the  bill.  The  bill  does  not 
say  anything  about  the  Federal  Board  for  vocational  education.  It  is  fair  to 
record  the  history  that  explains  why  that  is  so.  When  the  commission  was  consid- 
ering which  branches  of  the  government  were  to  be  included  in  the  Department 
of  Education,  the  director  of  the  Vocational  Board  appeared  before  the  com- 
mission and  notified  them  that  if  his  Board  was  included  in  the  original  draft 
of  the  bill  he  would  oppose  the  bill;  so  the  commission  left  that  board  out. 

98 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  99 

Suppose  that  a  new  department  is  created.  One  of  the  first  matters  that 
will  have  to  be  discussed  will  be  the  question  of  adopting  the  Federal  Board  for 
Vocational  Education  into  the  new  Department.  So  far  as  I  can  see,  there  are 
only  two  answers  to  the  question  raised: 

( 1 )  Either  the  Federal  Board  is  to  be  allowed  to  go  on  its  own  independent 
way  or  (2)  its  activities  will  have  to  be  taken  up  by  the  new  department.  If 
the  Vocational  Board  is  not  absorbed  we  shall  have  a  perpetuation  of  one  of  the 
most  damaging  policies  that  Congress  has  ever  adopted.  At  the  behest  of  com- 
mercial interests  Congress  passed  the  Smith-Hughes  law  and  drove  a  dividing 
wedge  into  our  unified  American  educational  system.  If  the  federal  government 
goes  on  separating  vocational  education  from  academic  education  it  will  be 
committing  a  grave  offense  against  American  institutional  life;  for  in  this  country 
we  have  and  ought  to  be  allowed  to  continue  to  develop  a  unified,  undivided 
educational    system. 

For  my  part  I  should  be  glad  to  see  the  Smith-Hughes  law  repealed  root 
and  branch. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  the  Federal  Board,  with  its  vast  powers  of  control, 
is  incorporated  into  the  new  Federal  Department  of  Education,  what  becomes 
of  the  boast  of  the  proponents  of  the  present  bill  that  they  have  eliminated 
federal  control  from  the  activities  of  the  Department?  A  transfer  of  the  Fed- 
eral Board  to  the  Department  will  result  in  the  most  extreme  form  of  control 
within  that  Department  of  at  least  vocational  education. 

The  question  I  ask  of  those  responsible  for  this  bill  is  a  grave  question. 
What  do  you  intend  to  do  about  vocational  education?  We  have  seen  two 
totally  different  policies  on  the  matter  of  federal  control  and  a  retreat  before 
the  Director  of  the  Vocational  Board.  For  one,  I  believe  it  is  fair  to  say  em- 
phatically that  we  want  a  program  for  the  new  department,  and  until  those 
who  are  in  charge  of  the  bill  can  give  us  a  clear  statement  of  what  they  are 
going  to  do  in  such  matters  it  is  not  wise  to  go  on  with  the  bill.  We  want 
to  know  what  Congress  has  in  its  mind  to  do  with  regard  to  control  of  indus- 
trial education.  Is  Congress  going  to  continue  its  unwise  policy  of  the  past 
or  has  it  met  with  a  change  of  heart? 

One  comment  may  not  be  out  of  place  in  regard  to  financial  support.  I 
may  be  allowed  to  say  that  personally  I  am  not  at  all  afraid  of  federal  con- 
trol. I  am  very  anxious  that  we  should  be  clear  with  one  another;  and  those 
who  do  not  believe  in  control  have  a  right  to  speak.  I  favor  certain  forms  of 
federal  control,  especially  in  those  directions  in  which  the  states  have  shown 
themselves  to  be  incompetent.  We  should  have  more  discussion  of  the  sort 
that  this  conference  has  brought  forth,  so  that  there  may  be  a  meeting  of  the 
minds.  So  I  say  with  regard  to  subsidies,  let  us  have  clearness.  Let  us  make 
our  federal  subsidies  on  a  sound  scientific  basis.  We  have  been  saying  to  the 
Superintendents  "Do  not  ask  your  community  for  funds  unless  you  are  clear 
and  have  distinct  grounds  for  your  demands  and  definite  plans  for  distribution 
of  the  funds.  Be  intelligent  before  you  go  before  your  people."  But  in  this 
larger  national  demand  we  have  gone  before  Congress  with  a  bill  that  lacks 
every  one  of  the  requirements  that  we  impose  on  local  schools.  Every  figure 
in  the  present  bill  is  a  mere  guess.  Not  only  so,  but  the  principles  for  the  dis- 
tribution of  such  funds  as  are  specified  are  a  deplorable  series  of  incoherencies. 
I  will  give  one  illustration.  Take  two  items — the  illiteracy  fund  and  the  teach- 
ers' fund.  The  illiteracy  fund  is  distributed  in  proportion  to  the  number  of 
illiterates  in  the  state.  Let  us  assume  that  this  is  a  wise  method  of  distribution. 
When  we  turn  to  the  teachers'  fund,  we  find  that  it  is  to  be  distributed  ac- 
cording to  the  number  of  teachers  in  the  state.  This  looks  like  the  same  prin- 
ciple as  that  accepted  for  the  distribution  of  the  illiteracy  fund,  but  in  reality 
it  is  the  reverse.  We  give  money  in  the  case  of  illiterates  to  cure  defects — we 
give  money  to  the  teachers  in  proportion  to  their  excellence. 


ioo  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

My  plea  is  not  against  federal  participation  in  education.  My  plea  is  rather 
for  and  in  behalf  of  much  participation.  I  join  the  great  group  of  those  who 
have  earnestly  hoped  that  in  time  we  may  have  a  bill  that  has  been  drawn 
with  the  most  careful  scrutiny  that  can  be  given.  I  ask  that  we  have  some 
discussion  and  get  these  things  thoroughly  thrashed  out  so  that  we  all  can  agree. 
So  far  as  I  can  exercise  any  influence  I  am  willing  to  promote  a  discussion  and 
to  take  part  in  any  consideration  that  looks  into  details.  In  my  judgment  the 
present  bill  needs  a  great  deal  of  reconstructing  and  I  hope  that  those  who  have 
promoted  it  will  take  seriously  the  example  of  the  University  of  Illinois  and 
hold  some  discussion  before  they  go  further.  The  show  of  unanimity  which  has 
been  made  is  a  forced  illusion.  The  caucus  methods  that  have  been  employed 
are  not  national  and  will  react  on  those  who  adopt  them. 

Discussion  and  revision  and  clearness  of  policy  are  the  only  devices  that 
will  save  this  measure. 

Hugh  S.  Magill,  Field  Secretary,  National  Education  Association 
I  have  been  very  interested  in  Dr.  Judd's  talk.  I  wish  to  say  as  one  in  very 
close  touch  with  the  campaign  that  has  been  carried  on  for  the  promotion  of 
the  Towner-Sterling  bill,  that  I  have  never  noted  any  disposition  to  suppress 
discussion.  On  the  contrary,  every  possible  effort  has  been  made  to  bring  about 
the  fullest  and  freest  discussion  of  the  bill.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  probably  no 
bill  ever  introduced  in  Congress  has  been  given  such  general  consideration  and 
public  discussion  as  this  bill. 

It  is  true  that  the  bill  has  gone  through  a  transformation  since  it  was  first 
drawn.  It  was  first  introduced  during  the  last  session  of  the  Sixty-fifth  Con- 
gress by  Senator  Hoke  Smith.  In  its  original  form  it  provided  that  plans  for 
carrying  out  the  provisions  of  the  act  within  the  several  states  should  be  sub- 
mitted to  the  Secretary  of  Education  for  approval.  This  provision  was  severely 
criticized  by  leaders  in  education  in  many  of  the  states.  As  a  result  the  bill 
as  revised  for  reintroduction  in  the  Sixty-sixth  Congress,  was  changed  to  meet 
this  objection,  and  to  preserve  state  autonomy  in  the  control  of  education. 

The  bill  was  known  in  the  Sixty-sixth  Congress  as  the  Smith-Towner  bill, 
introduced  in  the  Senate  by  Senator  Smith  and  in  the  House  by  Congressman 
Towner.  The  possibility  of  setting  up  executive  standards  in  the  administration 
of  the  act  was  denied  to  the  Secretary  of  Education  and  the  bill  made  to  ad- 
here to  the  principle  that  the  only  standards  which  could  be  set  up  were  those 
specifically  named  in  the  act,  or  what  might  be  termed  legislative  standards. 
Near  the  close  of  the  Sixty-sixth  Congress  the  bill  was  favorably  reported  by 
the  Committee  on  Education  of  both  Senate  and  House. 

Since  the  bill  was  not  passed  by  the  Sixty-sixth  Congress,  it  was  necessary 
to  reintroduce  it  in  the  present  Congress.  Before  its  reintroduction,  however, 
the  bill  was  carefully  revised  and  all  the  amendments  which  had  been  agreed 
upon  as  a  result  of  the  widest  possible  discussion  and  the  fullest  and  most  careful 
consideration,  were  incorporated  in  what  is  now  known  as  the  Towner-Sterling 
bill,  it  having  been  introduced  in  the  House  by  Congressman  Horace  Mann 
Towner  of  Iowa,  and  in  the  Senate  by  Senator  Thomas  Sterling  of  South  Dakota. 
The  present  bill  is  an  evolution,  and  its  present  form  is  the  result  of  a  pains- 
taking consideration  of  hundreds  of  suggestions  from  the  leading  educators  of 
the  country.  No  one  can  truthfully  say  that  the  leading  educators  have  not 
been  consulted.  This  bill  has  been  considered  at  the  annual  conventions  of  the 
National  Education  Association  for  the  past  three  years,  its  provisions  thor- 
oughly discussed,  and  its  principles  unqualifiedly  endorsed.  It  has  also  been 
discussed  at  three  successive  meetings  of  the  Department  of  Superintendence  and 
overwhelmingly  endorsed.  Dr.  Judd  himself  took  part  in  some  of  these  discus- 
sions. It  has  also  been  discussed  and  endorsed  by  state  teachers'  associations 
throughout  the  country,  and  by  hundreds  of  civic  organizations. 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  101 

Dr.  Judd  says  he  will  not  support  this  bill  unless  he  knows  definitely  what 
is  to  be  included  in  the  Department  of  Education.  The  bill  states  that  the  de- 
partment shall  include  in  addition  to  the  present  Bureau  of  Education,  such 
other  offices,  bureaus,  divisions,  boards,  and  branches  of  the  Government  as  Con- 
gress may  determine  should  be  administered  by  the  Department  of  Education. 
If  this  bill  ever  becomes  a  law  it  must  be  passed  by  Congress^  and  of  course 
we  must  leave  to  Congress  to  determine  what  should  be  included  in  the  proposed 
department.  Any  of  us  may  go  before  Congress  or  before  Committees,  and 
express  our  opinions.  Dr.  Judd  may  exercise  his  right  to  state  what  he  thinks 
should  be  included  in  the  proposed  department  and  what  he  thinks  should 
be  left  out,  but  when  we  have  all  expressed  our  opinions,  Congress,  in  exercise 
of  its  constitutional  right,  will  determine  the  question. 

Now,  a  word  regarding  the  amount  of  the  appropriations  suggested  in  the 
bill.  Dr.  Judd  declares  that  these  have  not  been  scientifically  arrived  at,  and 
that  before  pressing  the  bill  for  passage  we  should  find  out  exactly  how  much 
money  should  be  appropriated  for  each  of  these  specific  purposes.  Does  anybody 
know  exactly  how  much  money  would  be  needed  to  Americanize  the  foreigners 
who  have  come  to  our  shores  and  who  are  continuing  to  come  by  the  millions? 
Who  would  undertake  to  estimate  exactly  how  much  money  will _  be  needed  for 
physical  education,  for  the  training  of  teachers,  or  for  the  equalization  of  edu- 
cational opportunities?  To  suggest  that  we  ought  not  ask  appropriations  for 
these  worthy  purposes  until  we  know  exactly  what  no  human  being  ever  can 
know,  is  an  attempt  to  defeat  the  purposes  of  the  bill. 

But  if,  through  some  superhuman  knowledge,  we  did  know  exactly  how 
much  is  needed,  we  could  not  expect  Congress  to  give  us  all  that  we  would  ask. 
Anyone  who  has  ever  had  any  experience  in  securing  appropriations  for  public 
purposes  knows  how  impossible  it  is  to  secure  all  that  is  needed,  even  though 
the  amount  asked  is  very  reasonable.  Here  in  the  state  of  Illinois  the  friends 
of  public  education  asked  the  Illinois  Legislature  for  an  appropriation  of  twenty 
million  dollars  from  the  state  for  the  promotion  of  education.  This  amount 
was  less  per  capita  than  some  states  are  now  appropriating  and  more  than  others 
are  giving.  The  Legislature  finally  appropriated  eight  millions  of  dollars.  The 
proponents  of  this  bill  will  be  happy  if  Congress  will  make  a  good  start  in  sup- 
port of  the  purposes  named  in  the  act,  and  we  will  trust  to  the  expanding  vision 
of  future  Congresses  to  see  the  need  of  increased  appropriations  in  years  to  come. 

Regarding  the  matter  of  the  distribution  of  the  funds.  We  are  told  that  the 
principle  of  distribution  laid  down  for  the  promotion  of  the  training  of  teachers 
is  not  scientific.  That  is  simply  a  matter  of  opinion.  Many  of  the  very  best 
authorities  in  the  United  States  insist  that  it  is  scientific. 

Judge  Towner  has  called  our  attention  to  the  fact  that  the  Committee  on 
Reorganization  of  the  Executive  Departments  is  now  considering  the  whole  sub- 
ject, and  that  some  disposition  will  be  made  of  education.  Under  these  con- 
ditions, as  Judge  Towner  has  pointed  out,  it  is  clearly  the  best  policy  to  direct 
our  attention  first  to  obtaining  from  Congress  proper  recognition  of  education 
in  the  administrative  branch  of  the  Government,  and  adequate  provision  for 
the  proper  administration  of  its  educational  activities. 

This  is  the  question  most  imminent  at  the  present  time.  Any  educator  who 
has  a  sense  of  appreciation  for  his  profession  must  feel  humiliated  by  the  scant 
recognition  given  to  education  by  the  Federal  Government.  Think  of  the 
present  Bureau  of  Education  with  its  very  meager  appropriations,  under  a  Com- 
missioner who  is  paid  a  salary  smaller  than  that  paid  school  superintendents  in 
some  cities  of  less  than  fifty  thousand  population.  Education  as  a  Bureau  of 
the  Interior  Department  is  so  subordinated  that  it  has  no  power  and  very  lim- 
ited influence.  In  the  organization  it  is  on  a  par  with  the  Bureau  of  Fisheries, 
the  Weather  Bureau,  the  Bureau  of  Animal  Husbandry,  but  the  Bureau  of 
Education  receives  very  much  smaller  appropriations  than  any  of  these.  Educa- 
tion receives  less  than  one-half  of  one  million  per  year,  and  more  than  half  of 
this  amount  must  be  paid  to  take  care  of  the  reindeer  of  Alaska. 


102  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

Under  such  conditions  it  would  seem  that  all  the  educators  of  the  country- 
could  at  least  unite  on  demanding  that  education  shall  receive  better  recognition 
and  more  adequate  support  on  the  part  of  the  Federal  Government.  We  may 
expect  the  enemies  of  public  education  to  continue  their  opposition  to  any  bill 
which  provides  dignified  recognition  and  adequate  support  of  education,  but 
may  we  not  hope  that  such  forces  will  not  receive  aid  and  assistance  from  edu- 
cators and  those  who  claim  to  be  the  friends  of  education?  Mr.  Wells  has  said 
"The  development  of  civilization  is  a  race  between  education  and  calamity." 
We  know  that  Mr.  Wells  is  sometimes  right,  and  does  anyone  here  question  that 
he  is  right  in  this  statement?  If  the  future  of  our  Nation  depends  upon  the 
race  between  education  and  calamity,  who  can  deny  that  the  question  is  one 
of  primary  importance  to  our  Federal  Government?  Our  Nation  cannot  afford 
not  to  assist  the  states  in  the  promotion  of  that  which  may  save  us  from  na- 
tional calamity. 

W.  S.  Sutton,  Dean,  School  of  Education,  University  of  Texas 
I  wish  to  express  my  delight  at  the  presence  of  Senator  Sterling  and  Rep- 
resentative Towner  at  this  conference,  and  my  appreciation  of  their  unfeigned 
interest  in  educational  affairs  and  of  their  contributions  to  this  meeting.  It  is 
true  that  some  of  us  differ  with  them;  but  both  they  and  we  are  seeking  the 
same  end,  which  is  the  promotion  of  intelligence  and  virtue  throughout  the  land. 
Our  goal  is  the  same;  but  at  present  we  have  not  agreed  upon  the  method  of 
reaching  that  goal. 

One  should  not  protract  this  discussion  unduly,  but  he  will  be  pardoned 
should  he  offer  a  suggestion  or  two  that  would  throw  light,  rather  than  heat, 
upon  the  subject  we  are  considering. 

It  has  been  intimated  here,  and  I  have  heard  similar  accusations  elsewhere, 
that  some  university  people  are  opposing  the  Towner-Sterling  Bill,  possibly, 
because  they  are  not  in  sympathy  with  the  public  school  system.  I  cannot  let 
this  impeachment  pass  without  registering  at  least  a  mild  protest.  Taken  as 
a  whole,  university  men  in  this  country,  are  thoroughly  devoted  to  the  educa- 
tion of  all  the  children  of  all  the  people  at  public  expense.  Many  of  these  men 
have  grown  gray  in  the  service  of  popular  education.  Of  the  fidelity  of  these 
men  the  actual  facts  furnish  unmistakable  affirmative  evidence.  In  every  state 
of  the  Union  in  the  battles  for  public  education,  elementary  and  secondary,  as 
well  as  higher,  rural,  as  well  as  urban,  university  men  and  women  have  ren- 
dered conspicuous  and  valiant  service,  a  record  which  is  known  of  all  men 
familiar  with  the  educational  history  of  our  times. 

A  motto  handed  down  to  us  from  ancient  Rome  reads,  Festina  lente  (make 
haste  slowly).  This  injunction  should  be  heeded  by  legislators  of  the  people, 
for  surely  this  country  has  suffered  and  is  now  suffering  from  too  much  hasty, 
ill-advised  legislation.  It  pays  to  thresh  things  out  in  advance.  It  takes  up 
much  time  to  do  so,  but  it  saves  much  more  time,  not  to  speak  of  money  and 
temper,  also.  This  truth  was  in  the  mind  of  the  National  Tax  Association 
when  it  embodied  in  a  formal  resolution  its  unanimous  conclusion  that  it  is 
high  time  for  the  Federal  Government  to  cease  the  granting  of  new  subsidies 
until  the  whole  subsidy  question  be  thoroughly  investigated  and  understood. 
I  believe  we  ought  to  heed  the  warning  of  these  tax  experts,  and  take  some 
time  off  and  get  quiet  and  sit  down  and  think  things  out,  clean  out,  so  that  we 
shall  have  a  solid  basis  for  truly  national  and  genuinely  progressive  action. 

R.  A.  Pearson,  President,  Iowa  State  College  of  Agriculture,  Ames,  Iowa 
This  morning  we  were  discussing  the  subject  in  its  broadest  aspects.  This 
afternoon  we  have  been  thinking  mostly  of  the  one  bill  before  Congress.  I  have 
felt,  as  this  discussion  has  proceeded,  that  we  are  wading  into  deeper  water, 
that  is  more  and  more  murky.  We  do  not  know  what  is  ahead  of  us,  and  in- 
stead of  plunging  along  rapidly  we  should  proceed  very  slowly;  and  perhaps 
we   should   wait   awhile   before   we  move  forward  further.     It   was   mentioned 


PROPOSED  FEDERAL  LEGISLATION  103 

that  I  have  been  on  both  sides  of  the  fence  in  connection  with  college  and 
governmental  work.  As  an  officer  of  the  agricultural  department,  I  saw  college 
officers  violate  the  law,  and  as  a  college  officer  I  have  suffered  under  petty  rulings. 
I  have  sympathy  for  those  in  Washington  who  have  to  do  with  our  appropria- 
tion measures.  Many  of  them  are  big  men.  But,  very  many  of  our  troubles 
are  due  to  the  fact  that  so  many  administrative  details  in  Washington  are  di- 
rectly in  charge  of  men  having  small  ability.  There  are  now  a  great  many 
difficulties  which  cause  little  irritations.  It  seems  to  me  that  if  anyone  of  us 
were  confronted  by  such  conditions  in  our  own  business,  we  would  say,  "we 
will  not  continue  expansion  at  an  ever  increasing  rate  but  we  will  wait  awhile 
and  we  will  try  to  find  causes  for  this  and  that  particular  irritation,  and  iron 
out  as  many  as  we  can."  We  should  arrive  at  some  fundamental  principles 
which  will  enable  us  better  to  cooperate.  We  shall  always  have  cooperation 
between  state  and  federal  governments.  A  definition  of  cooperation  which  I 
like  was  given  by  Lucius  Wilson.  He  says  "Cooperation  means  so  to  conduct 
ourselves  that  other  people  can  work  with  us."  I  heartily  second  this  sugges- 
tion of  our  friend  from  Texas  and  our  friend  from  Louisiana  that  we  proceed 
slowly.  I  believe  that  Judge  Towner  has  a  great  idea.  I  think  something  good 
for  the  nation  will  come  from  his  bill  and  I  hope  the  Judge  will  have  the  honor 
of  leading  us  through.  I  hope  that  we  shall  all  be  content  to  go  a  little  slower. 
Let  us  get  the  facts  that  Dr.  Judd  indicates  are  needed,  and  then  we  shall  not 
have  much  trouble  in  deciding  what  is  wise  and  right.  Mr.  Chairman,  I  want 
to  thank  you  and  your  university  for  making  this  conference  possible. 


LIST  OF  DELEGATES  AND  REPRESENTATIVES  OF 
INSTITUTIONS  AND  LEARNED  SOCIETIES 

The  Rev.  William  Henry  Agnew,  President,  St.  Ignatius  Col- 
lege of  Loyola  University,  Chicago,  Illinois 

Robert  Judson  Aley,   President,   Butler   College,   Indianapolis, 
Indiana 

Edward  West  Allen,  Chief,  United  States  Office  of  Experimental 
Stations,  Washington,  D.  C. 

George  A.  Barr,  representing  Governor  Len  Small,  Springfield, 
Illinois 

Malcolm  Alfred  Beeson,  Dean,  Oklahoma  Agricultural  and  Me- 
chanical College,  Stillwater,  Oklahoma 

Edward  Asahel  Birge,  President,  University  of  Wisconsin,  Mad- 
ison, Wisconsin 

William  Waddell  Boyd,  President,  Western  College  for  Women, 
Oxford,  Ohio 

Silas  Alonzo  Braley,  University  of  Illinois,  representing  Morn- 
ingside  College,  Sioux  City,  Iowa 

Melvin  Amos  Brannon,  President,  Beloit  College,  Beloit,  Wis- 
consin 

William  Henry  Burger,  Northwestern  University,  representing 
the  University  of  Colorado,  Boulder,  Colorado 

Theodore  Chalon  Burgee,  President,  Bradley  Polytechnic  In- 
stitute, Peoria,  Illinois 

Edgar  Albert  Burnett,  Dean,  College  of  Agriculture,  Univer- 
sity of  Nebraska,  Lincoln,  Nebraska 

The  Rev.  James  A.  Burns,  President,  University  of  Notre  Dame, 
Notre  Dame,  Indiana 

Eldon  Grant  Burritt,  President,  Greenville  College,  Greenville, 
Illinois 

Julian  Ashby  Burruss,  President,  Virginia  Polytechnic  Institute, 
Blacksburg,  Virginia 

John  Callahan,  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction,  Wis- 
consin 

John  H.  Camlin,  Rockford,  President,  Illinois  Chamber  of  Com- 
merce 

Samuel  Paul  Capen,  Director  of  the  American  Council  on  Ed- 
ucation, Washington,  D.  C. 

Russell   H.   Chittenden,   Director,   Sheffield   Scientific   School, 
Yale  University,  New  Haven,  Connecticut 

Walter  Castella  Coffey,  Dean  of  the  College  of  Agriculture, 
University  of  Minnesota,  St.  Paul,  Minnesota 

Julian  Lowell  Coolidge,  Professor  of  Mathematics,  Harvard 
University,  Cambridge,  Massachusetts 

104 


LIST  OF  DELEGATES  105 

Thomas  Poe  Cooper,  Dean,  College  of  Agriculture,  University 
of  Kentucky,  Lexington,  Kentucky 

Stanley  Coulter,  Dean,  College  of  Agriculture,  Purdue  Univer- 
sity, Lafayette,  Indiana 

D.  D.  Crain,  Colorado  Agricultural  College,  Greeley,  Colorado 

E.  A.  Cross,  Dean,  Colorado  State  Teachers  College,  Greeley, 

Colorado 

Arthur  Hill  Daniels,  University  of  Illinois,  representing  Clark 
University,  Worcester,  Massachusetts 

George  Hutcheson  Denny,  President,  University  of  Alabama, 
University,  Alabama 

John  Robert  Effinger,  Dean,  College  of  Liberal  Arts  and  Sci- 
ences, University  of  Michigan,  Ann  Arbor,  Michigan 

Richard  T.  Ely,  Professor  of  Economics,  University  of  Wiscon- 
sin, Madison,  Wisconsin 

James  D.  Eskridge,  President,  Oklahoma  Agricultural  and  Me- 
chanical College,  Stillwater,  Oklahoma 

William  Esty,  Professor  of  Electrical  Engineering,  Lehigh  Uni- 
versity 

Livingston  Farrand,  President,  Cornell  University,  Ithaca,  New- 
York 

J.  D.  Fitz-Gerald,  University  of  Illinois,  representing  Columbia 
University 

Guy  Stanton  Ford,  Professor  of  History,  University  of  Minne- 
sota, Minneapolis 

William  Arthur  Ganfield,  President,  Carroll  College,  Wauke- 
sha, Wisconsin 

Chester  A.  Gilkerson,  Lewis  Institute,  Chicago,  Illinois 

Frank  Johnson  Goodnow,  President,  Johns  Hopkins  University, 
Baltimore,  Maryland 

The  Rt.  Rev.  Sheldon  Munson  Griswold,  Suffragan  Bishop  of 
Chicago,  representing  Union  College,  Schenectady,  New  York 

Louis  Edward  Holden,  President,  James  Millikin  University, 
Decatur,  Illinois 

Harvey  Daniel  Hoover,  President,  Carthage  College,  Carthage, 
Illinois 

Charles  Sumner  Howe,  President,  Case  School  of  Applied  Sci- 
ence,  Cleveland,  Ohio 

Orvin  Roe  Jenks,  President,  Aurora  College,  Aurora,  Illinois 

Willis  E.  Johnson,  President,  South  Dakota  State  College, 
Brookings,  South  Dakota 

H.  W.  Josselyn,  Washington  University,  St.  Louis,  Missouri 

Charles  H.  Judd,  Director,  School  of  Education,  University  of 
Chicago 


106  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

William  Jasper  Kerr,  President,  Oregon  Agricultural  College, 
Corvallis,  Oregon 

Louis  Oliver  Lehman,  President,  Eureka  College,  Eureka,  Illi- 
nois 

Henry  Boyer  Longden,  Acting  President,  De  Pauw  University, 
Greencastle,  Indiana 

Livingston  C.  Lord,  President,  Eastern  Illinois  State  Teachers' 
College,  Charleston,  Illinois 

C.  A.  Lory,  President,  Colorado  Agricultural  College 

Robert  Edward  Lyons,  Professor  of  Chemistry,  Indiana  Univer- 
sity, Bloomington,  Indiana 

The  Rev.  George  E.  McCammon,  President,  McKendree  Col- 
lege, Lebanon,  Illinois 

James  Lukens  McConaughy,  President,   Knox  College,  Gales- 
burg,  Illinois 

J.  M.  McConnell,  Commissioner  of  Education,  Minnesota 

John  Henry  MacCracken,  President,  Lafayette  College,  Easton, 
Pennsylvania 

Thomas    Hanna    McMichael,    President,    Monmouth    College, 
Monmouth,  Illinois 

Fred  Walter  McNair,  President,  Michigan  College  of  Mines, 
Houghton,  Michigan 

Frank  LeRond  McVey,  President,  University  of  Kentucky,  Lex- 
ington, Kentucky 

William  Arthur  Maddox,  President,  Rockford  College,  Rock- 
ford,   Illinois 

Hugh  S.  Magill,  Field  Secretary,  National  Educational  Associa- 
tion 

E.  D.  Meacham,  Professor  of  Mathematics,  University  of  Okla- 
homa, Oklahoma  City 

William  H.  H.  Miller,  Director,  Illinois  Department  of  Regis- 
tration and  Education,  Springfield,  Illinois. 

Richmond  Ames  Montgomery,  President,  Parsons  College,  Fair- 
field, Iowa 

Harcourt  A.  Morgan,  President,  University  of  Tennessee,  Knox- 
ville,  Tennessee 

Frederick  Blackmar  Mumford,  Dean  of  the  College  of  Agricul- 
ture, University  of  Missouri,  Columbia,  Missouri 

Reuben  Lovell  Nye,  Dean  of  the  College  of  Agriculture,  Syra- 
cuse University,  Syracuse,  N.  Y. 

Thomas  E.  Oliver,  University  of  Illinois,  representing  Western 
Reserve  University,  Cleveland,  Ohio. 

M.  J.  Otey,  Purchasing  Agent,  Oklahoma  Agricultural  and  Me- 
chanical College. 


LIST  OF  DELEGATES  107 

R.  A.  Pearson,   President,   Iowa   State  College  of  Agriculture, 

Ames,  Iowa 
Charles  M.  Poor,  Lombard  College,  Galesburg,  Illinois 

F.  M.  Porter,  University  of  Illinois,  representing  Ohio  Univer- 

sity 

George  Milton  Potter,  President,  Shurtleff  College,  Alton,  Illi- 
nois 

Thornton  L.  Pratt,  representing  the  University  of  Pennsylvania, 
Philadelphia,  Pennsylvania 

Edward  Everett  Rall,  President,  North-Western  College,  Na- 
perville,  Illinois 

Charles  Henry  Rammelkamp,  President,  Illinois  College,  Jack- 
sonville, Illinois 

Howard  Monroe  Raymond,  Acting  President,  Armour  Institute 
of  Technology,  Chicago,  Illinois 

William  G.  Raymond,  Dean,  University  of  Iowa,  Iowa  City 

G.  H.  Reavis,  Dean,  School  of  Education,  University  of  Pitts- 

burgh 

Rollin  D.  Salisbury,  Dean  of  the  Ogden  Graduate  School  of 
Science,  University  of  Chicago,  Chicago,  Illinois 

Harvey  J.  Sconce,  Illinois  Agricultural  Association,  Sidell,  Illinois 

Henry  W.  Schott,  Chicago,  representing  the  University  of  Kansas 

Walter  Dill  Scott,  President,  Northwestern  University,  Evans- 
ton,   Illinois 

Robert  Sidney  Shaw,  Acting  President,  Michigan  Agricultural 
College,  East  Lansing,  Michigan 

A.  M.  Shelton,  President,  Illinois  Educational  Commission 

The  Rt.  Rev.  Granville  Hudson  Sherwood,  Bishop  of  the  Dio- 
cese of  Springfield,  Springfield,  Illinois 

J.  H.  Skinner,  Dean,  Purdue  University 

William  E.  A.  Slaght,  Professor  of  Psychology,  Cornell  College, 
Cedar  Rapids,  Iowa 

Andrew  MacNairn  Soule,  President,  Georgia  State  College  of 
Agriculture  and  Mechanic  Arts,  Athens 

Thomas  Sterling,  U.  S.  Senator  from  South  Dakota,  Vermilion, 
South  Dakota 

William  Seneca  Sutton,  Dean,  College  of  Education,  University 
of  Texas,  Austin,  Texas 

George  Thomas,  President,  University  of  Utah,  Salt  Lake  City, 
Utah 

John  Martin  Thomas,  President,  Pennsylvania  State  College, 
State  College,  Pennsylvania 

E.  J.  Thompson,  North  Dakota  Agricultural  College 

William  Oxley  Thompson,  President,  Ohio  State  University, 
Columbus,  Ohio 


io8  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

Horace  M.  Towner,  Congressman,  8th  Iowa  District,  Corning, 
Iowa 

Robert  Lee  Tullis,  Dean  of  Law  School,  University  of  Louisiana, 
Baton  Rouge,  Louisiana 

Archelaus  Ewing  Turner,  President,  Lincoln  College,  Lincoln, 
Illinois 

Edward  Wight  Washburn,  University  of  Illinois,  representing 
Massachusetts  Institute  of  Technology,  Cambridge,  Massa- 
chusetts 

Gordon  S.  Watkins,  University  of  Illinois,  representing  Univer- 
sity of  Montana,  Helena,  Montana 

C.  H.  Watts,  Toledo  University,  Toledo,  Ohio 

Virginia  Hoyt  Weaver,  University  of  Illinois,  representing  State 
College  of  Washington,  Pullman,  Washington 

Phineas  L.  Windsor,  University  of  Illinois,  representing  Univer- 
sity of  Texas 

Phillip  Bell  Woodworth,  President,  Rose  Polytechnic  Insti- 
tute, Terre  Haute,  Indiana 


THE     PROGRAM 


Thursday,  December  1,  Auditorium,  2  p.  m. 

David  Kinley,  President  of  the  University  of  Illinois,  presiding 

1.  The  Early  Effects  of  Congressional  Appropriations  for  Edu- 

cation 

Eugene  Davenport,  Dean  of  the  College  of  Agriculture,  Director  of  the 
Agricultural  Experiment  Station,  Vice-President  of  the  University  of 
Illinois 

2.  Review  of  Recent  Federal  Legislation  on  Education 

Samuel  P.  Capen,  Director  of  the  American  Council  on  Education  (For- 
merly Specialist  in  Higher  Education  in  the  United  States  Bureau  of 

Education) 


University  Auditorium,  8  p.  m. 

W.  L.  Abbott,  President  of  the  Board  of   Trustees 
of  the  University  of  Illinois,  presiding 

Organ  Prelude — Piece  Heroique   Cesar  Franck 

Director  Frederic  B.  Stiven,  University  School  of  Music 

Invocation 

The  Right  Reverend  Grandville  H.  Sherwood,  Bishop  of  Springfield 

Installation  of  President  Kinley 

The  Honorable  William  L.  Abbott,  President  of  the  Board  of  Trustees 

Installation  Address 

President  David  Kinley,  University  of  Illinois 

University  Hymn Tune,  Adeste  Fideles 

Words  by  Doctor  John  M.  Gregory,  First  Regent  of  the  University 

109 


Greetings  from  Institutional  and  other  Representatives 

Honorable  Len  Small,  Governor  of  Illinois 

Honorable  Francis  G.  Blair,  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction 
Doctor  Livingston  C.  Lord,  President  of  Eastern  Illinois  State   Teachers' 
College 

Doctor  Charles  H.  Rammelkamp,  President  of  Illinois  College 

Mr.  Harvey  J.  Sconce,  First  President,  Illinois  Agricultural  Association; 

Mr.  John  H.  Camlin,  President  of  Illinois  Chamber  of  Commerce 

Doctor  Edmund  J.  James  President  Emeritus 

Doctor  Edward  A.  Birge,  President  of  the  University  of  Wisconsin 

Benediction 

Bishop  Sherwood 

Organ  Postlude — Sonata  No.  1 1,  First  Movement. ..  .Rheinberg 

Director  Stiven 


Friday,  December  2,  Morrow  Hall,  9  a.  m. 

K.  C.  Babcock,  Dean  of  the  College  of  Liberal  Arts  and  Sciences, 
Provost  of  the  University  of  Illinois,  -presiding 

1.  Problems  of  Administering  Federal  Appropriations  to  State 
Institutions 

E.  W.  Allen,  Chief  of  the  United  States  Office  of  Experiment  Stations 

2.  Problems    of    State    Universities    in    Administering    Federal 
Funds 

W.  O.  Thompson,  President  of  Ohio  State  University 

3.  Discussion 


Morrow  Hall,  2  p.  m. 
David  Kinley,  President  of  the  University  of  Illinois,  presiding 

1.  Federal   Aid   to   Education,    Its    Justification,    Degree,    and 
Method 

Horace  M.  Towner,  Congressman  from  the  Eighth  Iowa  District 

2.  Constitutional  and  Political  Significance  of  Federal  Legisla- 
tion on  Education 

Thomas  Sterling,  United  States  Senator  from  South  Dakota 

3.  Discussion 

no 


